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LINSEY-WOOLSEY 



AND 



OTHER ADDRESSES. 



/ BY 

ISAAC ERRETT, A.M., LL.D., 

FOUNDER OF " THE CHRISTIAN STANDARD," AND AUTHOR OF " EVENINGS WITH THE BIBLE," " WALKS 
ABOUT JERUSALEM," "TALKS TO BEREANS," ETC., ETC. 







OOPYfti^ 



7o? 3 V 



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CINCINNATI, OHIO: 
THE STANDARD PUBLISHING COMPANY, 

PUBLISHERS OF CHRISTIAN LITERATURE. 



T Hfi LIUUKY 
OF CONGRESS! 

JjASHINOTOJil 



El 



Copyright, 1893, b y 

John A. Pitts, Russell 'Errett and J. R. Errett, 

Executors of Estate of Isaac Errett. 




Q&^-^JL^ U2; 




CONTENTS. 

LINSEY-WOOLSEY. I 

Things in our own Immediate Neighborhood 34 

The Progressive Development of Religion 61 

Opportunity and Opposition 79 

Benjamin Franklin 101 

A Plea por Home Missions 120 

A View of the History of our Race, etc 136 

The Lessons of a Century 171 

Foreign Missions — the Platform 196 

Bible Translation 228 

Singleness and Worthiness of Purpose 243 

A Noble Friend of Humanity 273 

Oppositions of Science 294 

Fifty-nine Years of History 312 

Index 345 



INTRODUCTION. 



Four years ago Isaac Errett was called " to go home and 
rest — rest where there are brighter heavens, and richer 
flowers, and sweeter songs, and holier friendships" — four 
long, lonely years ago we " laid him in the chamber called 
Peace, with his face to the sun-rising." It has been a work 
of love, but one of many hindrances and discouragements, 
to secure material for the story of his life, and to collect and 
prepare his writing for publication. It was our purpose to 
begin with the biographical work written by that prince of 
scribes, Mr. J. S. Lamar, whose intimate acquaintance and 
faithful friendship, no less than his fidelity to the cause we 
plead, fit him eminently for the work which promises to be of 
deep interest and great value ; but, as that must of necessity 
be of slow growth, it has been decided to begin the publi- 
cation of the writings with this volume of addresses. With 
three exceptions, the addresses were never revised by their 
author, and were not intended for publication, and, therefore 
lack that " better literary finish " which he would have 
deemed necessary to render any work of his " somewhat 
worthy of public acceptance." There is " no crudeness of 
thought," " no unsoundness of teaching," in these pages, 
written " amid the heat and flurry of daily activities, the 
absorbing cares and anxieties that inevitably attend the life 
of an editor," in such hours as he could snatch from con- 
flicting duties. Remembering this, the reader may account 



VI. INTRODUCTION. 

for, if lie does not excuse, some inadvertencies. No utter- 
ance of tongue or pen, of our author, in all his long faithful 
service, but bears the impress of thought. It may be written 
over against every line of his writings, " words fitly spoken 
— apples of gold in pictures of silver " — but he " wished for, 
and dreamed of a time of release" from care and toil, when 
he could give undivided attention to a careful revision of 
his literary work. 

We have sought in vain for the manuscript of lectures 
and sermons to which he gave years of earnest study and 
careful thought — the better and grander work of his last 
years. But it remains for us in outline only ; or, like the 
charm of his radiant presence, the spell of his wondrous voice, 
" lingers in halls of memory and hearts of love." Hence our 
poverty in freshness and variety. But these are brave, noble, 
helpful words after all, and will help us " with earnest and 
joyful thanksgiving for the wonderful mercies of the past, 
to gird ourselves for the work yet before us ... to go out 
with fresh inspirations of faith and hope and love. ... to 
work while the day lasts. . . .till the night cometh when the 
gates of light open to receive us into the paradise of God." 

Cincinnati, Ohio, 

December 19, 1892. 



LINSEY-WOOLSEY 

AND OTHER ADDRESSES 



LINSEY-WOOLSEY. 



There is a curious precept in the Jews' religion, 
couched in these words : " Thou shalt not sow thy field 
with mingled seed, neither shall a garment mingled of 
linen and woolen come upon thee." 

It has been a matter of some trouble to commenta- 
tors to give a good reason for this injunction. 

Some have regarded it as referring to a garment 
made up of patchwork, of various materials and colors, 
for the sake of show, like Joseph's coat " of many- 
colors." 

In the Parson's Tale, in Chaucer, as quoted by Dr. 
Clarke, we have a description of this sort of dress as 
prevailing in the fourteenth century. The writer says : 

"As to the first sinne in superfluitie of clothing, 
suche that maketh it so dere, to the harme of the peo- 
ple, not only the cost of enbraudering, the disguised 
endenting, or barring, ounding, paling, winding or 
bending and semblable wast of clothe in vanitie. But 
there is also the costlewe furring in their gounes. So 



2 LINSEY-WOOLSEY, 

much pouncing of chesel to make holes ; so much dag- 
ging with sheres foorth, with the superfluitie in length 
of the foresaied gounes, to grete damage of pore folke. 
And moreouer, they show throughe disguising, in de- 
parting of their hosen in white and red, semeth that 
half their members were slain. They depart their 
hosen into other colors, as in white and blue, or white 
and black, or black and red, and so forth ; than semeth 
it as by variance of colorer, that the half parte of ther 
members ben corrupt by the fire of Saint Anthony, or 
by canker, or other such mischaunce. " 

Dr. Henry describes an English beau of the same 
period in the following terms : 

" He wore long pointed shoes, fastened to his 
knees by gold or silver chains ; hose of one color on the 
one leg, and of another color on the other; short 
breeches which did reach to the middle of his thighs — 
a coat, the one-half white, the other half black or blue; 
a long beard, a silk hood, buttoned under his chin, 
embroidered with grotesque figures of animals, dancing 
men, &c, and sometimes ornamented with gold and 
precious stones." 

If that was what was meant by linsey-woolsey, no 
wonder it was prohibited ; for with all the folly of 
modern fashions, the most ridiculous and absurd of 
them are not half so grotesque or silly as this. With 
all the love of display charged upon the ladies of the 
present time, we doubt whether such an overdose of 
the fantastical would be tolerated. 

But we apprehend that the text quoted refers to 
just such a mixture of linen and woolen in garments as 
makes up the linsey-woolsey of our own day. There 
is another regulation of the same character, but for 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 3 

which we can discern better reasons : ' ' Thou shalt 
not plow with an ox and an ass together." 
Several reasons may be suggested for this : 

1. It is unsightly . Say what you will about looks, 
there is a moral force in beauty, in symmetry, in order, 
in a gratified sense of the fitness of things. 

In order to the highest spiritual excellence, it is 
necessary to cultivate a love of the beautiful ; and home 
should therefore be adorned with just as perfect works 
of art and with just as pure a taste as our means will 
allow. Now to be compelled to look continually on 
anything so utterly incongruous, inharmonious and 
ridiculous as an ox and an ass yoked in one team, 
must necessarily degrade the taste ; and this was con- 
trary to the design of the Jewish economy, which was 
a " schoolmaster " to educate its subjects into nobler 
ideas and better life. The Jewish religion was a picto- 
rial religion, to educate through the eye the souls of 
a semi-barbarous people ; but there was nothing good, 
or noble, or elevating to be derived from such a picture 
as this, the picture of an ox and an ass. Indeed, in 
the descriptions of millennial bliss, in which the union 
of opposites and reconciliation of antagonisms is set 
forth by the most strange conjunctions and associations, 
such as the cow and the bear, the Hon and the lamb, 
the leopard and the kid, the little child and the cocka- 
trice, the prophets did not violate all propriety and 
degrade all imagery, by a union of the braying, kick- 
ing, long-eared, solemn donkey with the comely, 
patient, mild-eyed, submissive ox. 

2. It is degrading. It is well to form associations, 
somewhat unequal, when you can be sure that the efTect 
will be elevating-, but when its issues are degrading, it 



4 LINSEY-WOOLSEY, 

is to be avoided. Now the yoking of these two ani- 
mals could not elevate an incorrigible donkey into any 
better habits ; but it would inevitably degrade the ox. 
He would soon learn to kick, and balk, and rebel 
against authority — for it is true among animals as among 
men, that ''evil communications corrupt good man- 
ners." It is hard to conquer the prejudice against 
race, and much of it is unquestionably foolish ; but 
my conviction is, that the meanest, scrubbiest speci- 
men of an ox in all the land — even if he were a Chris- 
tian ox, fully indoctrinated in all of Christian benevo- 
lence that his oxhood could possibly appreciate — might 
righteously ask to be spared the indignity of an associ- 
ation with the best looking and best behaved donkey 
in existence. 

3. It is unmusical. The refining influence of music 
is generally admitted. We all know what Shakespeare 
says of "the man that hath no music in his soul," as 
being only fit for "treason, stratagems and spoils." I 
strongly suspect the donkey comes under this reproba- 
tion. At least, if he has any music in his soul, it stays 
there ; his efforts to produce it must be regarded as 
failures. 

The longest-lived among them never lived long 
enough to get his throat cleared. This musical defect 
is evidently in the organs of the voice. It certainly is 
not for the want of ear, nor yet for want of practice. 
But that one of them ever got through the gamut, or 
learned anything beyond an abominable trill . of 
demi-semi-quavers, we seriously doubt. And yet the 
pretentious beast is forever practicing the most dif- 
ficuit music, attempting to excel in fortissimo, and 
diminuendo, and magnificent swells, executed with a 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 5 

gravity and persistence altogether remarkable. The 
imperturbable gravity with which he attempts to palm 
off his asthmatic wheezings as first class, genuine melo- 
dies, proves that, like many another ambitious empiric, 
he has mistaken his calling, or else that he is the most 
arrant humbug in existence. Now, a horse knows he 
can not sing, and has sense enough not to try. His 
communications are always, not yea, yea ; but neigh, 
neigh. Now if the ox could in any way supplement or 
complement the braying of the ass, and give any sense 
of completeness to the performance, or relieve it with 
any grateful contrast, we might derive benefit from the 
association ; but, unfortunately, the ox's standard of 
music is low ; he can never get beyond a solo ; that is 
to say, his low is always so; and it is difficult to con- 
ceive of anything more discordant than an attempt on 
the part of these two animals to perform a duet — they 
do it so abominably. 

Whether you regard this association physically, 
morally, or esthetically, there is no good to come of it. 

There is yet another prohibition in this curious law: 
"Thou shalt not sow thy field with divers kinds of 
seeds." 

This we can understand as a wise regulation, since 
many seeds would mingle and degenerate. I think the 
evident intention of all these regulations, while they 
may have had an immediate economical bearing, was, 
to familiarize the minds of the people, through the 
physical, with the idea of moral separateness. They 
were slow to learn. Their instruction was through 
sensuous channels. They were made to know in these, 
and a series of similar laws, that God called them to be 
a separate people ; that they must preserve themselves 



6 LINSEY-WOOLSEY, 

from contamination with the idolatrous nations round 
about them ; and learn to keep their hearts and lives 
free from all that would corrupt and degrade them. 

This was especially important in view of their per- 
petual tendency to blend themselves with surrounding 
peoples, and copy their ways, a tendency that seems 
never to have been fully arrested until after the Baby- 
lonish captivity. 

"But what of all this?" you are ready to ask. I 
answer: The same lesson is needed to-day in all de- 
partments of life — among all classes of society. We 
are necessarily the creatures of society, more or less. 
Our happiness depends much on others. Even 
Robinson Crusoe, when " monarch of all he sur- 
veyed," was glad to welcome a savage as an associate, 
and found in his '• man Friday " a treasure worth more 
than all on the island besides. And unquestionably 
we owe much to society, and should carefully discharge 
our duties % to society, and avail ourselves of the 
advantages to be derived from good associations. But 
society presents many phases ; there is evil in it as well 
as good ; and there is great danger that the evil will 
overbalance the good, unless there is, back of society, 
a proper self-hood. The brightest and wisest practical 
morality in this world is, "Thou shalt love thy 
neighbor as thyself." So far from ignoring self, there- 
fore, we are required to make our knowledge of self 
the standard of what is due to others. It never was 
meant — not even in the family, and certainly not by 
any communism that men may invent — to annihilate 
individuality. A man and his wife may be one ; but 
they are also two, and there is no sense and no value 
in the oneness that does not grow out of the twoness. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. ] J 

So far, the Woman's Rights movement is just; women 
have a right to protest against this legal and social and 
political annihilation of their existence, which insults 
them as mere ciphers, that depend on place, on the 
right or left side of a male unit, for all their importance. 

We are in constant danger of getting things mixed — 
sometimes ludicrously; sometimes very disastrously. 
Our lives are about such a jumble as the man's prayer 
when he said : ' ' O Lord, have mercy on a race of guilty 
sinners, of whom I am chief among ten thousand, and 
altogether lovely." That was a linsey-woolsey prayer. 

Let us look at some of the phases of life in our 
own land, and see how we wrong ourselves by array- 
ing our lives in linsey-woolsey garments. 

Here are lads growing up. What are they living 
for ? What are they aiming at ? Could one in a hun- 
dred tell ? Beyond the enjoyment of the present 
hour — getting through with the burdens of to-day, and 
anticipating the frolics of to-morrow — there is scarce a 
thought of the future. There is no clear, definite aim, 
nor are there any well-defined, fixed principles. In 
many cases, this is not to be much censured, for some 
natures develop late, and the might that is in them 
slumbers until some emergency arises to wake it, and 
they astonish themselves and everybody else with their 
achievements. But these are the exceptions. Generally 
character is fixed at an early period ; and where there 
are no clear, settled principles and aims, the field is 
sown with divers kinds of seeds — wheat, rye, barley, 
oats — especially wild oats — cheat, cockle, and what- 
ever may chance to fall in it — and the harvest is 
dreadfull) r mixed. It requires the heaviest threshing 
machines, and great tribulations, and wind-mills, and 



8 LINSEY-WOOLSEY, 

sieves, to separate the good from the bad, and even 
then it is an inferior crop, and has to be disposed of 
below market price. 

Here is one of the great evils of life. No one, 
perhaps, sets out with a deliberate intention to be bad ; 
but most set out without a positive intention to be 
good, and only good. Their principles are linsey- 
woolsey. Their field is not fenced and carefully planted 
with only choice seeds. 

Parents let their children run exposed to every kind 
of influence. The garden of the heart is never weeded ; 
and when the heart begins to produce a bad harvest, 
they send the reprobates 'off to school and college to 
have the wickedness threshed out of them, and hire 
some patent educated windmill to blow away the chaff 
and smut. There is neither economy nor justice in 
this. It costs ten times more to undo the wrong than 
it would have cost to train them in the right, and they 
are losers by it every way. 

Well, these lads come to college after a time. Have 
they any idea what they want ? Have they any aims ? 
Not one in twenty. With as blind an aim they could 
not hit an elephant at twenty feet of distance. They want 
to be educated ; but in what ? for what? Every idea of 
life and its employment is vague. Help them to a con- 
clusion ; persuade them to attempt certain definite ob- 
jects, and as soon as the tug comes, and they see it is 
going to cost hard work and plenty of it, the lack of 
principle allows discontent to creep in, and soon they 
have dropped their studies and are off in a dreary chase 
of some new phantom. They may overcome this, and 
after long floundering settle down to some sober, in- 
tellectual pursuit. After a time they come out from 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 9 

college, having graduated with fair honors ; and now 
the grave problem of life stares them in the face. 

One of the most experienced and fatherly of col- 
lege presidents made a remark some years ago, that 
of all the students he graduated, take, say, a class of 
twenty, he never expected to hear anything very grati- 
fying of more than two or three of them. Can you 
tell why ? 

Look at their dress — their moral dress, I mean : 
linsey-woolsey. These young men go out into the 
world with a discordant mixture of principle and 
motive, with an ox and an ass yoked up to the 
plow, and they can neither* make a straight furrow, 
nor do steady plowing. Mostly the time is occupied 
in balking and kicking, breaking. the traces and mend- 
ing the harness. They are not going to be drunkards — 
that is the ox ; but they are going to drink whenever 
they want to — that is the donkey; and directly you 
will see them wallowing in the gutter, where even the 
braying ass would be disgraced by their relationship. 
They are not going to gamble — oh no ! they are only 
going to play for fun, and for a drink now and then ! 
They are not going to be dishonest — not at all ; but, 
then, they are " fast young men/' and horses and wine 
and women cost something ; and bills come in, and the 
pocket is empty, and there must be a little cash ab- 
stracted from the money-drawer of an employer, and a 
false entry made in the books ; and this goes on until 
there is fraud and forgery and ruin. They are not 
going to be irreligious, not by any means; but, then, 
it would be unmanly to be serious and devout ; and so 
they go to church and to the ball-room; they say 
prayers, and go to see the Black Crook or the White 



lO LINSEY-WOOLSEY, 

Fawn ; they study and spree ; they attend to business 
and do honestly until they can not afford it any longer ; 
and every day the evil gains on the good, until they 
give up the struggle and sink into debauchery or dis- 
honesty and utter recklessness. Mike Fink, when he 
was suddenly plunged into a predicament that was at 
once ludicrous and frightful, and was in danger of in- 
stant destruction, said that he prayed and he cussed, 
and he cussed and he prayed, but neither of them did 
any good, because they were so awfully mixed. Such 
is the sad contradiction — sad, yet ludicrous — that be- 
longs to thousands of lives ; but they do not often, 
like Mike, come out even; the cussing generally 
triumphs over the praying, and the field sown with 
divers kinds of seeds is found at last all overrun with 
Canada thistles, with their roots so deep that you can 
never get them out. 

Young men, allow me to say to you, without de- 
siring at all to lead you into somber views of life, that 
the paths of this world are beset with a thousand 
snares, and that a successful journey is only assured to 
him who has one mind f and dares to live according to 
it. It is a comparatively easy thing to attain to success 
where the aim of life is pure and noble, and the toiler 
hews to the line. 

Throw your heart out to commons, and let every 
wild beast pasture on it, and every wild plant drop 
its seed there, and the more generous the soil, the 
richer the harvest of shame and ruin to be reaped 
at last. Many years ago, but within my recollection, a 
boat with three young men in it floated down Niagara 
River. They had whiskey along, and a gay time was 
theirs. They became so absorbed in the excitement 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. I I 

of the hour as to forget all danger, and were drawn 
down into the rapids before they were aware. 

What became of two of them was never known. 
But the third one, a young man named Avery, was 
discovered wedged in between two rocks just above 
the Falls of Niagara, and stretching out his hands 
towards the shore for help. It seemed impossible to 
help him, but the sight of him stirred the people to 
bold effort. They constructed a raft and floated it out 
into the current, and sent it down ; but it was dashed 
to pieces against the rocks before it reached him. 

They constructed another. They raised up on the 
shore large placards, exhorting him to hope on, and 
they would save him. His poor old father stood 
among the crowd, watching. After several ineffectual 
efforts they at last got a raft within his reach, and in- 
tended as soon as he boarded it to draw him to shore. 
He extricated himself from his imprisonment in the 
rock, and got on the raft, and a great shout went up 
from the excited crowd. Cautiously, but lustily, they 
began to pull at the ropes, and the raft began to move 
toward the shore ; and every heart beat high. But 
directly the angry current seized it like a plaything 
and dashed it against the rocks, and the poor fellow, 
with his hands lifted up to heaven, and a wild shriek 
of despair, went plunging over the cataract into hope- 
less death. 

Take care ; the rapids are below you ; you must not 
be off your guard. It may be pleasant floating with the 
current for a little while, but when your unguarded 
bark sweeps into the rapids, and you are hurried over 
the boiling waters in fearful haste, society may look on, 
and pity, and try to save, but all too late. 



12 LINSEY-WOOLSEY, 

There is needed among our young men greater self- 
assertion, a more sacred and honored self-hood, that 
shall forbid either a tame submission to the will of 
others, or an ignoble reliance on the aid of others. 

I know this may be carried too far. It may be de- 
veloped into cynicism and into ridiculous vanity. I 
have it on good authority that a very distinguished 
citizen of the United States, and a high official, was 
walking down street in one of our cities just after the 
attack on Fort Sumpter, and when the whole country 
was in a state of painful uncertainty and wild with ex- 
citement. This distinguished citizen had been a little 
sick for a few days, and was out for the first time to 
take an airing. A gentleman meeting him, who sup- 
posed, from his official position, that he would be in 
possession of the most authentic information, said to 
him, very anxiously: "Good morning sir; have you 
any news this morning?" "Oh! lam much better, 
thank you, sir!" was the reply. 

What was the perilous state of the country in com- 
parison with the tickling in his most distinguished 
throat ? 

That was carrying self-hood a little too far; and so 
it was in the case of another very worthy man who, it 
is said, never heard his own name mentioned without 
lifting his hat, and making a polite bow ; yet I confess 
that I prefer even this to an unmanly cringing to pop- 
ular sentiment, a base bowing of the knee to public 
opinion, a servile dependence on others for one's opin- 
ions or one's standing. 

The former is simply a harmless vanity, which may 
and does consist with the highest manliness ; the latter 
is the denial of one's own manhood, which leaves noth- 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 1 3 

ing in the soul on which a permanent character can be 
built. 

And in the case of young ladies, is it any better ? 
Take the fairest specimen you can find that is at all a 
representative one, and what do you see? 

Much that is good, no doubt, and something that 
is lovely. She is virtuous, and we will even say pious 
in her aims. She means to be good, intelligent, kind, 
courteous and benevolent. She aspires to be honor- 
able and honored among her sex. She thinks some- 
times, as she has a right to think, of getting married, 
and her ideas of a home and home-life are worthy and 
commendable. But with all this, society will not allow 
her to be true to herself. 

Can she be true to her own instincts, her own idio- 
syncrasies, her own deepest soul-longings, or her own 
profoundest judgment ? No ; everything that is pecu- 
liar must be eliminated, even if it is that which, in 
healthful development, would be the chief glory of her 
character. "What will society say ? " "What will the 
people think ? " are the questions that an anxious father 
and mother sound in her ears. If she is pretty and 
smart, she must be offered in sacrifice on the altar of 
fashion, for the sake of society. She must tame herself 
down to be a mere parrot, and learn to simper, and 
wriggle, and flirt, and dance, and reduce her life to a 
mere empty round of frivolities, even when her earnest 
soul is protesting indignantly against it ; and become, 
in society and in church and in the family, a servile im- 
itator in every thing that passes current in good society. 

And if she is not pretty nor smart, her mediocrity 
is to be veneered with fashion's choicest mahogany, 
and she must learn to resort to deceptions, and play a 



14 LINSEY-WOOLSEY, 

false part, and live under a mask until she is success- 
fully traded off, and some luckless wight is put under 
legal bonds to be a victim of fraud for a life-time. And 
when these grow to be women, they are the saddest 
mixture in their characters. 

One is not what she might have been ; the other is 
not what she seemed to be. Neither of them is what 
God made her to be. They have no principles of their 
own, no tastes, nor habits; but are the veriest slaves; 
not daring to think, or speak, or dress, or act, except 
at the bidding of society. 

Society means a few who compose the ton. They 
give law to the community. 

If any of the ton gets a new bonnet, v/hether it 
should be four inches in diameter, or four feet, every 
body else must have a new " love of a bonnet," exactly 
like it. And so of every article of dress and equipage. 
If a leader of society graciously condescends to sneeze, 
you can hear the sublime echo of sternutatory eloquence 
from a hundred inferior noses. This contemptible 
toadyism reminds us of the official bulletins in Russia, 
wherein it is announced that his majesty has been gra- 
ciously pleased to take a bad cold. Next day the bul- 
letin declares that his majesty condescends to feel bet- 
ter, and it is hoped that in a day or two it will be his 
imperial pleasure to be entirely well. 

If Mrs. Highflyer adopts the Grecian Bend, you will 
soon see all the ladies in town bent forward as if a 
severe attack of rheumatism were drawing them double. 
If she talks about the fiihst cuhcles, and me lawd Bom- 
bakstees, why then all tongues must twist and all lips 
must pucker until they can say fuhst cuhcles, and me 
laivd Bombastes just like she. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. I 5 

It would make no difference if it were to walk back- 
wards, or wear a hump on the back as big as a camel's, 
or to talk through the nose, or to squeeze the nose in, 
or pull the ears out, so long as fashion required it, it 
would instantly become law. 

And so our women, as well as our men, are the 
slaves of others, and are all clad in linsey-woolsey. 

The result of this is not yet seen in our country. It 
leads to a restless attempt to ape those in better cir- 
cumstances, and even large incomes are absorbed in 
the effort to keep up appearances, Children have to 
be dressed with any quantity of crimps and flounces ; 
young ladies occupy a large share of their time in min- 
istering to appearances, anxious mammas are feverish 
over the idea of somebody else's children getting ahead 
of theirs in dress. 

Parties become a scene of rivalry where all depends 
on the mantua-maker and milliner, the dry-goods mer- 
chant and the jeweler ; churches become glaring tem- 
ples of fashion, and men spend a weary life of toil, and 
probably end in bankruptcy, in a vain effort to keep up 
appearances. 

I said we had not begun to see the result of this yet. 
It is just beginning to be seen. It was seen in Rome, 
when this mad career of fashionable extravagance had 
been carried so far that marriage fell almost into desue- 
tude, because people of the middle class could not afford 
to marry. 

The downfall of Rome dates from that period. And 
it is coming to this in our country, that young men in 
moderate circumstances are afraid to marry. It is as 
much as and sometimes more than they can honestly 
do to maintain themselves in fashionable style ; and to 



1 6 LINSEY-WOOLSEY, 

take on, in addition, the expense of a wife and a house, 
and meet the demands of society, is more than they 
dare attempt. They could live sensibly and comfort- 
ably, but they can not live fashionably. The result 
will be, if this folly continues, a decay of marriage ; 
and the results of this, in various ways, are vastly more 
alarming than we can take time now to discuss. 

Look again at the business of life. Everywhere you 
are pained at the discovery of the mixed principles 
that govern men. 

Take it in politics, during the war, it was somewhat 
consolatory to think, in the midst of treason and re- 
bellion, that there was so much of lofty patriotism 
and self sacrifice ; but a nearer view dissipated much of 
the charm, as you saw these noisy patriots clamoring 
for fat places, army contracts, positions in regiments or 
brigades, etc. ; until it seemed as if it was largely a cal- 
culation how to trade in the lives of men for personal 
advantage. 

And in our politics in time of peace, who thinks any 
longer of purity of elections, or purity of legislation ? 
It is largely only a question of whether a man has 
money enough to carry his measure. Judges are bought ; 
justice is dealt out for a price. The corruption is such 
in almost all high places that money is fast becoming 
the "one thing needful" to pave one's way to success 
in any rascality, however barefaced, or any crime, how- 
ever appalling. 

Two of the most powerful states of this union are 
owned by railroad corporations ; and we are tamely 
submitting to a plutocratic tyranny which in any other 
country would produce insurrection. 

In commercial circles there is noticeable a fearful 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 1 7 

degeneracy in point of integrity. Peculations, frauds, 
deceptions of every kind, are tolerated. There is no 
rascality that is not tolerated, and even applauded, if it 
is only successful. And men do not seem to pause to 
inquire whether a thing is right, but only if it can suc- 
ceed. 

Through a long series of deceptions and falsehoods 
and dishonesties, men will hold stoutly on their way, 
and you never know a relenting of conscience until 
they fail. Many successful adventurers and most of 
our millionaires are rascals. 

It is not in the nature of things that they could so 
often succeed in amassing fortunes so rapidly if there 
were not wrongs and frauds practiced, and injury done 
to others. Yet the public worship them until they 
fail. If the reckless gamblers in the gold ring in the 
great excitement some time ago had only succeeded, 
they would havd been caressed and flattered and lion- 
ized. As long as the Tammany ring succeeded, it 
was worshiped, and its tremendous rascalities passed as 
skillful diplomacy. They failed, and they are derided 
for their failure, more than for their dishonesty. 

When the Irishman fell from a high scaffold, and 
was taken up senseless, he was asked, after he came 
to : " Did the fall hurt, Patrick ? " ' ' Not in the laste, 
honey," was the reply; " the fall niver hurt me ; it was 
the sudden stopping that knocked me sinseless intirely. " 

So men go on in moral degeneracy, falling all the 
time, but never thinking that the fall would hurt even 
if they fall into the bottomless pit. It is the sudden 
stopping only that they mourn over. 

Can you name a business, a profession, a trade, in 
which falsehood, deception or humbug is not playing a 



1 8 LINSEY-WOOLSEY, 

part ? I will begin with my own profession. Clerical 
robes are too often made of linsey-woolsey. I do not 
refer to those who dress in woolen only — the wolves in 
sheep's clothing who now and then startle the land 
with their infamies ; but to large numbers of ministers 
of good repute, and who are generally men of more or 
less merit. But they are not themselves. They are 
slaves, slaves of custom, of sect, of creed, succumb- 
ing to influences that spoil them of much of their 
manhood, and abandoning themselves often to mere 
cant and rant. 

Can any sensible man tell why, as soon as a man 
enters the pulpit, he should lose his own voice and look 
and mien, and appear in a strange character, almost as 
much as if he were a play-actor? He can not read 
a hymn naturally. He can pray only with a pulpit 
tone. He can not speak without a whine, or a stilted 
measure and tone to his sentences. What is the 
matter? Is it a heavenly influence, or is it a foolish 
surrender to the tyranny of custom ? Then how many 
are content to work away on the old treadmill, merely 
echoing the sentiments of others ; and if they ever 
feel like breaking the shackles and thundering out their 
own deepest convictions, they tremble lest the people 
will not hear it, and persuade themselves that they are 
not worthy to undertake so grave a task ; or they get 
into a fashionable church, where a crowd of linsey- 
woolsey worshipers are intent on reconciling God and 
mammon, and have no idea of a preacher's duty be- 
yond meeting the wants of the hearers who pay him 
well to amuse them with rhetorical pyrotechnics. He 
preaches on such delectable themes as The Voice of 
Antiquity, or The Lily among Thorns, or Science the 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 1 9 

Handmaid of Religion, or The Sacred Mountains, or 
The Window in Noah's Ark, or The Dream of Pilate's 
Wife, — anything but the sin that curses men, the 
Saviour that redeems them, the wrongs that are sink- 
ing them to hell, or the stern conflicts with evil to 
which the voice of duty calls them. I say this with a 
deep conviction that as a class the clergymen of our 
country are among the most honorable, pure, self-de- 
nying and earnest of any class of society. Of course, 
then, when I find even here much that derogates from 
the excellence that ought to belong to them, and from 
the power which ought to be almost omnipotent if man- 
fully used, I can not be expected to pass a more favor- 
able judgment on lawyers with their tricks and quirks 
and quibbles ; doctors with their empiricisms and 
quackeries; merchants who never have anything but 
the best, and uniformly sell below actual cost ; brokers 
who live only to accommodate their customers; and 
tradesman generally, who are constantly engaged in 
doing for every one what they would n't do for any one 
else. So special a favorite is every one that comes in, 
the wonder is how any one lives at all. 

Everybody is offering the best at a great sacrifice, 
and buyers are always paying more than a thing is 
worth. Every horse sold is the best horse and the 
cheapest ever sold, and the dearest ever bought ; and 
the world is so full of generous people who have been 
engaged for a lifetime in laboring for the good of others 
to their own injury, that it is really a matter of sur. 
prise that they have not all been involved in bank- 
ruptcy long ago ! 

I will not venture on another branch of this sub- 
ject — the actual humbugs that are palmed off con- 



20 LINSEY-WOOLSEY, 

tinually — for its magnitude is beyond our capacity 
of management. Medicines that always cure ; genuine 
Monongahela rye, twenty years old, o»r brandy at $8.00 
per bottle, that was made next door, within a month, 
and has not a drop 0/ pure liquor in it ; gift concerts, 
where watches worth $500, and pianos worth $800 can 
be had for twenty-five cents ; sewing machines for one 
dollar; learning made easy, and language acquired in 
twenty lessons; dollar stores, where- for every dollar 
laid out you will receive $25.00 worth in return; pat- 
ent bread, patent churns, patent stoves that will cook 
in the summer time without heat, and heat in the win- 
ter time without fuel ; patent glasses that will restore 
sight to the blind ; patent music that will enable every 
one to sing scientifically in a few hours ; and patent 
everything except sense and honesty, for which there 
is so small a demand that a patent on these would be a 
losing concern. 

Another specimen of linsey-woolsey is seen in the 
mixed elements in religious character. I do not think 
that my religious ideas have any taint of asceticism. I 
have no sympathy with that kind of piety which is 
distressed at a hearty laugh, and rolls up its eyes in 
holy deprecation of all relish of the good things of 
this life. But evidently religion was meant to effect 
such a regeneration of human nature that its subjects 
would be, in important respects, "new creatures." In 
point of honesty, benevolence, the regulation of the 
passions, the fear of God, and the hope of heaven, it 
is contemplated that its subjects shall be a "peculiar 
people." It is not expected that they will be faultless, 
nor that they will never be inconsistent, nor that they 
will all be equally good ; for the material religion 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 21 

works on varies in quality, and at all times it is a con- 
flict with evil, in which occasional reverses must be ex- 
pected. But with all these abatements, it still remains 
true that a genuine Christian character, whatever its 
defects, will be pitched on a nobler principle, and sus- 
tained by nobler inspirations than can be claimed by 
any worldly character whatever. 

And so it is, we are happy to say, in thousands of 
cases ; but when you look at the masses of professsors 
of religion, are you particularly struck with this differ- 
erence ? In what respect are they changed ? I fear 
the change is about what a missionary reported in one 
case. He had been distributing tracts, and one day a 
poor fellow came in to thank him for the tract, and to 
tell what great benefits he had derived from it. "That 
tract has wrought a great change in me, sir, that tract 
has ! Before I read that tract, sir, I did n't care for 
God or the devil ; but since I read it, sir, / loves 'em 
both alike /" 

That is about as far as the change goes with linsey- 
woolsey professors. Their religion is not a renuncia- 
tion of the world and of sin, but rather an artful at- 
tempt to incorporate God and heaven with it — to rec- 
oncile God and mammon ; to insure against damage by 
fire in the future world at a certain per cent ; and the 
principle effort is to keep the policy paid up. But so 
far as pride, fashion and extravagance go, or shrewd 
and sharp business practice, or avaricious grasping for 
gain, or participation in oppressive monopolies, or reck- 
less stock gambling, or unprincipled speculations, or 
selfish disregard of the wants or woes of others, or 
pride of caste, or any other prevalent folly or sin, who 
can say that the distinction betwe-en the church and 



22 LINSEY-WOOLSEY, 

the world is a marked one ? Religion is with them a 
matter of taste, or of emotion, or of social advantage, 
to make the world more enjoyable ; and its purer and 
sterner phases are all unknown to them. Imagine a 
gay votary of fashion and pleasure, arrayed in a glory 
above that of the queen of Sheba, and fairly blazing 
with jewelry, who has spent hours at the toilet before 
church-time, singing: 

"A broken heart, my God, my King, 
Is all the sacrifice I bring." 
Or a keen, eager, restless, avaricious trader, his head full 
of visions of a rise in the price of stocks, or of wheat, 
or of pork, or lands, attempting the devout strain : 

11 On Jordan's stormy banks I stand." 
Or a soft devotee of luxury, selfishly devoting his days 
and nights to gormandizing and dissipation, sighing 
forth on the Sabbath: 

"O tell me no more of this world's vain store." 
Happily they do not have to sing much. A paid 
choir comes from the opera or the dance-house to do 
the singing for them; and they have but to foot the 
bill and keep their insurance policy paid up. I am not 
speaking of the hypocritical, but of the masses of ap- 
parently honest and sincere people. They have be. 
come accustomed to this low and unworthy idea of 
religion, and they have no ambition to go beyond it. 
It is a selfish attempt to reap the advantages of religion 
at a miserably low rate, and trade on the mercy of God 
for their own carnal advantage. 

There is another class outside of the church, in 
which similar inconsistencies are found. By education 
and surroundings, they are led to sympathize with 
religion, and they like to weave in a certain amount of 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 23 

linen with their woolen in the garb of character. But 
you can not bring them to a manly acceptance of the 
obligations of religion. They form, in some respects, a 
contrast with the class we have described. Those pray, 
but they will not pay ; these pay, but refuse to pray. 
Those profess, but do not practice ; these are willing to 
practice to a certain extent, but they will not profess. 
Those are great on forms and ordinances, and tithe 
the mint, anise and cumin accurately, while the weightier 
matters of the law are neglected ; these contemn the 
ordinances, and make morality every thing, yet even 
their morality is linsey-woolsey. They are not uniform- 
ly moral. They have their pet virtues, and like the 
doctor who was great on fits, and had to throw every 
patient into fits before his medical skill was available, 
they have to reduce everything into their own denomi- 
nation of virtue before they can make any display. 
One man prides himself on honesty : he keeps his 
word ; he never cheats ; his notes never go to protest ; 
but he is mean, selfish and stingy to the last degree. 
Another prides himself on his benevolence: he never, 
never fails to answer a call of distress ; but he gets as 
drunk as a fool every now and then. Another is pub- 
lic-spirited, and makes himself generally useful, so 
that the community could hardly get along without 
him ; but he swears like a trooper, and lies like Baron 
Munchausen. And here is a lady who is remarkable 
for leading off in all good works ; but she is dreadfully 
given to gossip— and so it goes. There are two troubles 
in all these cases. 

I. The good that is in them serves to sanctify the 
evil, and for a time makes their wrongs respectable, or 
at least tolerable. 



24 LINSEY-WOOLSEY, 

2. The evil is sure to get advantage of the good. 
Sow your field with mixed seed, and the most worth- 
less will triumph over the most valuable, and finally 
usurp possession of the soil. It can never be a desir- 
able character. 

Again, in education this same mixing process is 
growingly manifest. The high aims of education, to 
develop the whole man, physically, intellectually and 
morally, into perfect symmetry, subordinating merely 
animal and material interests to those which are intel- 
lectual and spiritual, are greatly interfered with and 
degraded by the ultilitarianism of the age. It is too 
long and too weary a toil to plod for five or six years 
along the beaten paths of learning; shorter methods 
must be adopted. It is no longer a question : Will it 
develop my nature? Will it give me true manhood, 
and fit me for higher usefulness? But, will it pay? Is 
it easy ? Can I get through soon ? 

So teachers are forced to devote themselves to 
shallowness, and content themselves with imparting a 
smattering of knowledge, and aim to make it as showy 
as possible. Schools and colleges must teach a little 
of everything, and not much of anything, and the 
student's robe is a good deal like that described in the 
beginning of the lecture — a ludicrous combination of in- 
congruous patches ; a coat of many colors. And the 
worst of it is that, so far as there is any definiteness of 
aim in education, it is a low and mercenary aim. It is 
simply to secure what will be available for some line of 
business. The elevation of the mind, the invigoration 
of the reasoning powers, the expansion of the soul into 
large and generous fellowship with the true, the beauti- 
ful and the good, the impulsion of the higher nature 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 25 

forward in a career of investigation in which it may 
successfully develop its immortal powers in nobler 
directions, all this is nothing. Give us something in 
twelve lessons that can enable us to make a living 
without hard work, or show us how to turn one dollar 
into a hundred — that is what we want. And if you 
can not give it to us, we will start to-morrow for the 
city of Humbug, where the distinguished Professor 
Hocus Pocus engages to fit us for the most honorable 
positions in one term, and get us good places at large 
salaries when we are through. This is to me the most 
contemptible and odious of all the quackeries of the 
time. A man may be deceived with balsams, and elix- 
irs, and sarsaparillas, and patent churns, and all that, and 
escape without greater loss than a few dollars of money, 
or a few retchings of stomach in nature's revolt against 
the imposition ; but here it is the loss of that which 
more than all else ennobles and glorifies human nature 
and human character, and the life-long poverty and 
bankruptcy of soul into which these imprudent pre- 
tensions lead so many of our young men. 

I will notice only one more instance of this incon- 
gruous mingling of distinct and discordant elements. 
And as I have given most of this lecture to the gentle- 
men, it is but fair that the ladies should be honored 
with more special attention ere I close. We have been 
accustomed to think that women were different from 
men ; that difference of sex involved a difference of 
physical organization, of physiological characteristics, 
of mental and spiritual aptitudes, and, of necessity, of 
spheres of activity. 

We had supposed that woman was the heart of 
society, not its head; and that her scepter was the 



26 LINSEY WOOLSEY, 

gentle but all potent one of love ; that gentleness, and 
purity, and refinement, keen perceptions and quick in- 
tuitions, the love of the beautiful, and delight in the 
spiritual, gave her a special sphere of power, and a 
peculiar line of pursuits and enjoyments, not separate 
from man's, indeed, nor at war with it, but such as 
would complement his defective nature, and enable 
each to find in the other what was necessary to its per- 
fection. 

We had thought that what we call man was only 
half of a complete being, and that woman was the 
other half; and that perfection of life and enjoyment 
was only to be found in the union of the two. It 
seems we were mistaken. It is now discovered that a 
woman is as much of a man as any other man, and 
that it is downright injustice to doom her to house- 
keeping and the round of domestic duties, when she 
is just as capable as man himself to vote and to fight, 
to sit on juries, go to congress, or sit in the president's 
chair. And it is accordingly proposed to invest her 
with all the rights and responsibilities of citizenship, 
abolishing entirely the distinction of sex. 

Now, to guard against all misapprehension, I will 
say here that I believe that woman has been very un- 
justly dealt with, and shut out from many pursuits for 
which her nature eminently fits her ; and I should be 
sorry to speak one word that could be construed into a 
disregard of her right to all that can elevate her nature 
to greater power for good. 

But on this one point before us I am constrained 
to regard the Woman's Rights movement as utterly at 
war with nature and with common sense. I have no 
special repugnance to women's voting, so far as the 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 2J 

welfare of the country is concerned. When we let 
every race and every grade of men share that privilege, 
so that not only the ox and the ass are yoked, but the 
lion and the opossum, the elephant and the tadpole, 
the tiger and the mule, the bear and the pig, the hyena 
and the coon, the gorilla, the monkey and the lizard — 
all the motley throng of big and little, wise and igno- 
rant, of every land and every religion — it ought not to 
be regarded as particularly dangerous to let our women 
have an equal chance to vote ; nor when brutal pugilists 
and reckless gamblers and drunkards go to congress, 
need we be alarmed at the thought of sensible women 
legislating for us ; but that it would prove dishonoring 
and degrading and demoralizing to woman herself, I 
have little doubt. Her charm, her power, is in her 
weakness, her delicacy, her purity. She can not come 
into whiskey-rings, and political caucuses and can- 
vasses, and banter rude and coarse and unprincipled 
men at the hustings, and subject herself to the fierce- 
ness of political animosity, and the trickery of politi- 
cians, without dissolving forever the charm by which 
she holds her present potent sway over mankind. It 
is an attempt to mix and mingle elements of character 
and of life which can only produce the coarsest kind of 
linsey-woolsey. We are told that she will refine politi- 
cal society and banish the coarseness and corruptness 
that now prevail. But with all possible respect and 
reverence for woman's nature, I am compelled to dis- 
sent. Woman, when started in a wrong direction, 
grows worse more rapidly than man, and descends, if 
possible, into deeper degradation. Her fine nature 
once marred, her delicacy once overcome, the angel 
soon becomes the demon. She sways a scepter from 



28 LINSEY-WOOLSEY, 

the veiled throne of her womanly power, that would 
soon be torn from her grasp in the rude contest of pro- 
miscuous crowds ; and even in her return to her home 
she would no longer be the gentle, loving spirit that 
husband and children would want to revere. 

Sometimes women are taunted with the question, 
whether, if they were allowed to vote, they would con- 
sent to fight. It is ignorance that propounds this ques- 
tion. Women can fight. I do not refer to single in- 
stances, as the Maid of Orleans, and her of Saragossa; 
but women en masse can fight, and fight bravely. To 
give only one instance, in the wars of the Netherlands 
with Philip II, in the siege of some of the cities, the 
women acted a part which for bravery and persistent 
daring and heroic sacrifice can never be surpassed. 
I do not doubt their ability. But, then, who wants to 
see them fight ? Who wants a fighting woman for a 
wife, a hardy soldier with bloody hands for a bosom 
companion? Surely, surely there is better work for 
woman to do, and nobler fields for the exercise of her 
powers. The period of Lacedemonian degeneracy was 
when the women ceased to be women, and took hold 
of affairs of state. The period of Roman degeneracy 
was when marriage fell into desuetude, and woman left 
her natural sphere to search for other fields of ambi- 
tious gratification. The conservative power of our 
country is largely in our homes, and when these are for- 
saken or neglected, and the home-circle is no longer 
the theater of woman's queenly power, the days of our 
republic will be numbered and the handwriting will be 
seen on the wall. It should be every woman's ambi- 
tion to be a wife and a mother ; to educate herself for 
this, and to subordinate all else to this grandest aim of 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 20, 

her earthly being. We are told of the three -fourths of 
a million of excess of the female sex in our country ; 
and we are asked, what will you do with these? I 
answer that this changes the plea. It is no longer a 
plea for woman as such, but for a particular class of 
women. It is a grave question, what shall be done for 
them. I am not disposed to ignore it. I would have 
them marry, if possible. Why not ? If we can not bal- 
ance matters with other nations, and get enough clever 
men imported to take them in hand and provide for 
them, then we must open paths of industry for them 
in such spheres as they can successfully occupy; and 
in this I am disposed to go as far as the most radical 
advocates of their rights would ask. But this is not a 
question of woman's rights, but merely of justice to a 
particular class oi women, and a very worthy class too. 
We advise women to eschew linsey-woolsey; to be 
women, and not men ; to assert the less noisy but more 
potent dominion of gentleness and purity and love 
which God has given to them, and to remember that 
they are a power behind the throne greater than the 
throne itself. That woman is in some respects inferior 
to man, and in others his superior, is, I think, beyond 
question. I have pleasure in awarding to her all that 
she can claim in intellectual and spiritual endowments, 
and I would open to her every avenue to employment 
in which she can succeed and still preserve the peculiar 
charm of her nature inviolate ; but let her be woman, 
and not man ; the heart, and not the head. 

It is worthy of remark, that when the redeemed and 
glorified are represented to us as arrayed for their en- 
trance on the scenes of eternal felicity, their robes are 
not linsey-woolsey, but "fine linen, clean and white; 



30 LINSEY-WOOLSEY, 

for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints." We 
must take our linsey-woolsey garments to pieces, and 
" reconstruct " our robes with pure linen ; singleness of 
purpose, purity of principle, oneness of aim must 
characterize us if we would stand at last among the 
bright immortals. We must learn rifle practice and 
become sharpshooters, able to hit the target in the 
center. Any idiot can take an old firelock musket and 
fire at the universe, and stick a few stray shot into 
something somewhere ; but it takes a steady hand and 
an educated vision and long practice to hit the center 
at long range with a rifle ball. I know that where 
there is this intensity of purpose and concentration of 
thought and will, there is apt to be something rugged 
and unamiable and forbidding in the character ; for it 
is rock — hard, jagged rock — and in your fall against it 
you will be broken. You would rather fall into the 
mud. But, after all, who would not rather be granite 
in his character, than soft, oozy mud ? Look at that 
hairy, stern, terrible looking Elijah, dealing in fire and 
hot thunderbolts. He was not popular as the pliant 
Ahab; yet Ahab would have been forgotten but for 
Elijah. Even the fierce Jezebel has a sublimity of 
character which makes Ahab contemptible in her 
presence, albeit it was a sublimity of evil. 

Look at John the Baptist, in his hairy garments, 
dwelling apart from men, and refusing all participation 
in the pursuits of the world. Yet he no sooner lifts 
his voice than all Judea gathers at his call, and all men 
do him homage. 

Look at Luther, and Calvin, and Knox; stern, un- 
compromising, terrible men, hated, maligned, perse- 
cuted ; yet they live to-day in millions of our race, and 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 3 1 

sway the destinies of earth's most enlightened nations, 
while the trimmers and time-servers of their day have 
passed into eternal oblivion. 

Look at William the Silent, most glorious of men, 
who, against the overpowering wealth and despotism 
of Spain, at a time when the riches of the world were 
pouring into her coffers, and the ablest general of the 
age commanded her veteran troops, held all that power 
at bay, and defended the Netherlands against it in a 
long series of miraculous heroisms and endurances that 
extorted the admiration of the world. He had one 
thought in his soul — civil and religious liberty. To this 
he consecrated his life, for this he sacrificed his honors, 
and wasted his estates, and exhausted his fortune. 
When Spanish gold corrupted his main adherents, and 
the whole land seemed turned against him, in a most 
sublime devotion to principle he stood erect, like a lone 
rock in the ocean, against which the waves dashed in 
vain. Single handed he was more than a match for 
Philip II. and his vast empire — Spain's armies defeated, 
and all her arts and policies frustrated by this one 
glorious man. It was resolved at last to put a price on 
his head, and trust the assassin to rid the world of his 
unconquerable presence. For his presence, and his 
incorruptible truthfulness, and his lofty self-devotion, 
found allies in the winds and waves, and thunders and 
lightnings, and the stars in their courses fought for 
William the Silent ; armies of heaven fought for him. 
The assassin laid him low at last. But even then his 
power did not die. His spirit glided along the dykes 
and canals and over the marshes of Holland, and 
through the streets of Antwerp and the great marts of 
commerce, until the long and dreary and terrible 



32 LINSEY-WOOLSEY, 

struggle ended in the complete emancipation of the 
Netherlands, and the planting of free institutions which 
stand to-day the pride and the glory of Protestant lands. 
We can not all fill such a place ; but we can all, in 
our respective spheres, cultivate the same high manli- 
ness, and according as it is given to us, act our part in 
the great drama with equal credit, and wear an immor- 
tal crown. 

We talk of the wonders of the world, but to me the 
sublimest of wonders is a genuine man or woman, suc- 
cessfully battling against the witcheries of sin and sense, 
and overcoming all earthward gravitations in a deter- 
mined ascent to the mountain top of truth and righteous- 
ness. Anxiously, tremblingly, he touches the keys until 
he is sure he has struck the true key-note of existence. 
Carefully, prayerfully, sleeplessly, he surveys the heav- 
ens until he detects the polar star of his hopes. Through 
a thousand fears and strifes and experiments, he suc- 
ceeds in rigging and trimming his vessel, and obtaining 
chart and compass that he can trust, and then commit- 
ting himself to the God who ruleth the winds, and 
stayeth the raging of the seas, he ventures bravely out 
on the voyage of life. Contrary winds detain him ; 
contrary currents oppose him, and eddies whirl and fogs 
encompass him. Tempests break over him. Sirens sing 
along the dangerous coast ; false lights hang out over 
perilous rocks ; but with his eye on the chart and the 
compass, and his soul mounting above the storm, he 
triumphs over wind and wave, and sirens, and pirate 
forces, and ploughs his way sublimely through the 
threatening billows, until he greets with joy the sight of 
the desired haven. And though he comes in weather- 
beaten, battle-scarred, and maimed, with shattered 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 33 

hulk and tattered sails, and his log-book tells of a 
weary wandering over pathless wastes, where often the 
last gleam of hope was about to be quenched in rayless 
night, still he is there, in port, home at last, and home 
forever ; and to him the God of heroes says : 4 ' Thou 
shalt walk with me in white, for thou art worthy." 



THINGS IN OUR OWN IMMEDIATE NEIGH- 
BORHOOD. 

It was a plank-road meeting. The inhabitants of 
an exceedingly rural district, to whom the mails were 
dragged once a week, through many miles of unbroken 
forest, through deep mud, and over primitive corduroy 
roads, and who were very anxious to increase the 
facilities for communication with the outer world, had 
assembled to devise means for accomplishing that de- 
sirable object. The most feasible plan was to build a 
plank-road. It was, to these primitive backwoodsmen, 
a glorious vision. They had little cash, but any 
amount of timber; and plenty of axes, and strong 
arms to wield them ; and saw-mills enough to convert 
the logs which the hardy axemen brought them into 
lumber. 

Experience had not yet demonstrated the untrust- 
worthy nature of this sort of highways — its cost of 
construction and of everlasting repairs. There was 
only present in their imaginations the blissful contrast 
between the weary struggles through bottomless mire 
at the rate of a mile in three hours, and sometimes at 
no rate at all, except a steady rate downwards, into 
deeper helplessness, so that if not a voluntary, there 
was a compulsory adherence to the apostolic admoni- 
tion: "Stand, therefore, and, having done all, to 
stand " — the blissful contrast, I say, between this soft, 
unlovely and unpoetical muddiness and deep distress, 
and the smooth, cheery, glib gliding over the solid 
plank, untroubled with any fears of the ' ' horrible pit 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 35 

and the miry clay " with which they had been but too 
familiar. So they came together in answer to a written 
call tacked on the school-house door, to consider of 
this matter. The meeting was organized. A verdant 
orator whose possibilities of fame had up to this hour 
slumbered in profoundest quiet, or at best had clothed 
themselves in dreamy fancies, arose to address the as- 
sembly on his wooden theme. The crisis of his life was 
upon him. The destinies of his earthly life were sus- 
pended on the issues of the occasion. He was big 
with his theme — a lumbering one, it is true ; and the 
ideas of his auditors were altogether muddy ; but he 
must bring them out of the depth of mud in which 
they too long had wallowed, and elevate them to a 
nobler platform, every plank of which should have the 
merit of solid worth. He felt the difficulty of his re- 
formatory effort ; for he knew how hard it is to lift 
people out of the ruts in which they and their fathers 
had plodded their way so ingloriously, even if it was 
clearly for the better. But he was resolved to charm 
them into attention and storm them into wisdom. So 
he leaped at once into his subject in the following ma- 
jestic style: 

"Mr. President and Fellow-Citizens: — While 
the cosmopolite is plowing his way over stormy seas, or 
climbing perilous heights, and scaling precipitous rocks 
to enjoy the intoxicating inspirations of a rarified 
atmosphere on Alpine summits, amid the everlasting 
glaciers, or toiling with the weary caravan over burning 
deserts, or resting in Oriental indolence beneath the 
stately palm, or hunting the lion in exciting chase 
through the jungles, or wandering amid the melan- 
choly ruins of cities of ancient renown, pensively 



$6 OUR OWN NEIGHBORHOOD, 

meditating on the vanity of human wishes and am- 
bitions, or meeting the gaze of the solemn sphinx, 
whose riddle is yet unsolved ; while the geologist, my 
fellow-citizens, is digging into the stony heart of earth, 
and compelling dumb nature to disgorge secrets that 
have been stereotyped in rock and hidden away from 
the curious gaze of man, that he may translate and 
render to a startled world the sublime revelations of 
these most ancient records of the doings of omnipo- 
tence ; and while the astronomer, Mr. President and 
fellow-citizens, forgets the earth and its cares, and 
soars away on the wings of science to immeasurably 
distant fields of light, and wanders gaily through the 
fields of immensity, dancing with the stars in their 
glorious rounds, or chasing comets in their eccentric 
flights, until his soul is wrapt in a blaze of glory, 
and his genius sparkles with the fires of heavenly con- 
stellations ; I say, Mr. President, let the cosmopolite 
roam, and the geologist dig and burrow, and the as- 
tronomer gaze and fly ; but let us attend to things in our 
more immediate neighborhood ! We need a plank-road. " 
The plank-road champion was right. His com- 
position may not have been according to the best wis- 
dom and taste of Ouintilian, and his inflated sentences 
might be condensed into solider utterances; but his 
sentiment was just. Of what avail is geology or as- 
tronomy or extensive travels to a man with a four-horse 
team and a heavily loaded wagon, stuck in the mud ? 
He can see all the stars he wants to see when he strains 
himself in a dead lift at his swamped wagon, and 
bring up more geological specimens on his boots than 
he cares to examine, every time he drags himself out 
of the mire. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 37 

Yet there is a strong propensity to busy ourselves 
with things at a distance, to the neglect of things in 
our more immediate neighborhood. We are fonder of 
the telescope than of the microscope, though a careful 
use of the latter might reveal to us a thousand things 
of greater practical moment than ever reward the 
curiosity of the star-gazer. Some people will watch 
all night, the year round, searching for a new asteroid, 
or r©b themselves of sleep for a week watching for a 
meteoric shower, that could not tell you, if their life 
depended on it, the constituent parts of the soil they 
walk on, or the number of bones in their own bodies, 
or the elements combined in the air they breathe, or 
where their spleen is located, except when they find it 
at the end of their tongues, ready to spit itself at the 
first inoffending head that comes along. There are 
travelers every year going abroad to " see the world," 
who pass within a mile of Niagara Falls without seeing 
them, on their way to visit Mt. Vesuvius ; although, 
as the Yankee said when a foreigner vaunted to him : 
"In our country, sir, in our country, we have Mt. 
Vesuvius." "Have you ?" said Jonathan ; "well, in 
our country we have the Falls of Niagara, that could 
put it out in five minutes." People study French and 
German, and Latin and Greek and Hebrew, that can 
not spell half the words in their own language, and are 
shamefully ignorant of their own literature. Men talk 
learnedly of Gauls and Britons, and the siege of Troy, 
and the glories of Marathon, that never read a history 
of the war of 1812 ; and talk oracularly of the Justinian 
Code and the Code Napoleon, that could not give an 
intelligible exposition of the main features of the Con- 
stitution of the United States. I once knew a clergy- 



38 OUR OWN NEIGHBORHOOD, 

man, learned and devout, that when his parishioners 
sent him a barrel of flour for his family, and several 
bags of bran for his cow, returned a note of acknowl- 
edgment, thanking them for the flour, but stating 
that he did not know what that stuff in the bags was 
meant for — thus frankly confessing that /ie did n' t know 
bran. 

Two of the most eminent literary gentlemen of 
England tried one day to get a collar off a horse, and 
having exhausted their strength and skill in a fruitless 
effort, sagely concluded that it was made on there, or 
was part of the horse, and was not intended to come 
off ; and they stood aghast when the stupid hostler 
came up and turned the collar round and slipped it 
over the horse's head. Even the great Dr. Chalmers, 
author of the astronomical discourses, is said, when he 
paid a visit to his sister, to have turned his horse loose 
in her garden ; and when the animal had tramped down 
the flower-beds, spoiled the vines, and ruined things 
generally, his innocent remark was: <# I didn't think 
the animal was so senseless ; I thought he would have 
keepit to the walks." 

All these gentlemen needed to attend to things in 
their more immediate neighborhood. 

And then, again, there are people who are good 
enough — altogether too good — at attending to things 
in their neighborhood, that have yet to learn to at- 
tend to things in their more immediate neighbor- 
hood. I have seen women, for instance, who were so 
busy watching their neighbors' housekeeping, and so 
shocked and oppressed at the thought of their slat- 
ternly ways, that they had no time to keep their own 
houses in order, and mourned literally in sackcloth and 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 39 

ashes at home, over their neighbors' want of tidiness ! 
I have seen men so knowing about the affairs of other 
people in their town, and so absorbed in interest over 
their delinquencies and approaching bankruptcies, that 
they entirely forgot to pay their own debts, and in a 
fit of abstraction went off one day without thinking to 
settle with anybody. There are people who know just 
exactly how and what everybody ought to do to make 
the community rich and prosperous, that never know 
how to make enough to keep their families from starv- 
ing ; and others who are busy keeping a whole town 
in order and mourning over the disorders of the times, 
whose own homes are very pandemoniums of strife 
and confusion. And I have seen church members, too, 
who possessed such exuberant benevolence as to part 
with every word of the sermon for the benefit of 
others ; and like Artemas Ward, who so dearly loved 
his country as in his superhuman patriotism to offer all 
his wife's relations in sacrifice, they, in their excessive 
humility and goodness, are willing to confess the sins 
of all their neighbors unreservedly. 

I once had a man complain to me that during prayer 
a large part of the assembly gaped idly arround, and 
some were winking and laughing; and it greatly dis- 
turbed his devotions. I asked him how he knew it. 
"Why," said he, "I saw them with my own eyes." 
Then you were looking too, were you ? That man was 
not attending to things in his immediate neighborhood. 

But, are any of us guiltless in this matter? Look 
at society. 

How anxious we are about things several removes 
from us. About the Bible in the schools, rather than 
about the Bible in our own families ; about the church, 



40 OUR OWN NEIGHBORHOOD, 

its purity and growth, rather than about our own indi- 
vidual purity and growth in grace; about the success 
of the temperance society, more than about the success 
of temperate mc ; about the salvation of the inhabitants 
of ' ' Borrioboola Gha, " while the heathen at our doors 
are neglected. Men will go from Cincinnati to the 
North Pole to search for the bones of Sir John Frank- 
lin, with a zeal and enthusiasm you could not put into 
them in behalf of the thousands of helpless and dying 
ones that need their assistance only a few squares off. 
We have temperance societies, and Daughters of Re- 
bekah, and Masons, and Odd Fellows, and Young Men's 
Christian Associations, and various clubs and political 
associations to keep the country from ruin, and innu- 
merable charities for the amelioration of the condition 
of society, and Women's Rights Associations ; and by 
the time that men and women have gone the rounds of 
serving the public at festivals, and sociables, and secret 
societies, and public meetings in behalf of some great 
public interest, and have been hard at work all day 
Sunday trying to help other people to be good, it is found 
that they have been compelled to neglect their own 
families almost entirely ; the things in their immediate 
neighborhood have been overlooked, and the only 
remedy is to turn their children on the public, and ask 
the church and the state to do for them what they 
were under the most solemn obligations to do for them- 
selves. They send their children to the public school 
to be educated in secular wisdom and manners, and to 
be reformed of their disorderly habits ; to the Sunday- 
school for a knowledge of the Bible, and to church to 
be converted. And if these fail, and their children 
grow up to be reprobates, then they turn them over to 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 41 

the temperance society to cure them of drunkenness, 
to the Young Men's Christian Association to redeem 
them from bad company, or send them to the reform 
school to save them from the penitentiary ; and when 
they have run their short career of folly and sin, and 
have come down to premature death, the Masons or 
Odd Fellows must take them in charge to see that they 
are buried ; and all this because parents did not attend 
to things in their more immediate neighborhood. Their 
children go on crutches through the world, moral crip- 
ples, or are stayed and bolstered by the public, simply 
because they were not educated at home to manliness, 
intelligence and piety. 

Let me not be understood as denouncing all these 
associations. Many of them are needed, as society now 
is. But if our homes were what they ought to be, 
many of them could be dispensed with, and the rest 
would have a higher mission than is now assigned them. 
We are loading the church, the state, and voluntary 
associations, with burdens that belong to the individual 
and to the family. That is the great evil. 

We have three divine institutions to promote 
human welfare and meet human wants : the family, 
the state, and the churcff 

The first is the primal social institution, small in 
its domain and dominion. The state is an aggre- 
gation of families, larger or smaller, according to 
geographical, ethnological or other distinctions. The 
church is ecumenical, reaching out after universal 
brotherhood, and extending the dominion of the 
grace of God as wide as the reign of human sin and 
human woe. These have their respective aims and 
functions — an interesting and profitable subject of in- 



42 OUR OWN NEIGHBORHOOD, 

quiry, but not in the range of our subject to-night. 
Of these three institutions the family is the oldest, and, 
you will allow me to say, the most important.. For 
two thousand years family religion was the only divine 
religion. The church and the state are supplied from 
the family, and are largely what the family makes them. 
If the family existed in its integrity, the state would 
have but limited functions, and the church would take 
on a different character. If we brought to the state 
educated citizens, and to the church children trained 
at home to fear God and keep his commandments, and 
if personal responsibility and self-control in church and 
state were what they ought to be and might be, it is 
easy to see that the state would have little governing 
to do, and the church, in place of spending her strength 
to straighten what we have allowed to grow in crooked- 
ness, or to shape and polish the unshapen or misshapen 
natures we bring to her altars, would grow silently up 
with layer on layer of shapely and polished stones, and 
squared and solid timbers, without sound of hammer, 
or ax, or saw, to disturb the sacred peace and quiet 
that should ever dwell in the temple of Jehovah. But 
we are ever seeking to shift our responsibilities on to 
the state and the church. The state must educate, 
and the state must prohibit the sale of liquors, and the 
state must reform the vicious and the criminal; and the 
church must convert reprobates, and the church must 
instruct our children in religion, and the church must 
promote virtue and piety ; and if this fails, then we must 
have societies, young men's societies, and young 
women's societies, and societies for the drunken, and 
for the fallen, and to prevent cruelty to animals, etc., 
etc. There is only one thing left : that is to break up 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 43 

housekeeping, and let the state board us and clothe us, 
or establish some system of communism, where every- 
body shall be everybody else's wife or husband, or 
father or mother, and all the holy ties of kindred and 
home be destroyed. 

It is time to explain to you that when I chose the 
title for this lecture, "Things in Our Immediate Neigh- 
borhood," I had my mind fixed on home as most im- 
periously demanding our attention. 

We are losing our home affections, we are neglect- 
ing our home duties, we are degenerating as to home 
virtues, and we need plain and pungent discussion of 
this side of social life. Let us, then, look for a little 
while at home. 

Did our time allow, we would go back of home to 
the individual man, and treat of him in his self-hood. 
But we can not afford it now.* 

Let us pass by the season of courtship, and mar- 
riage, and the honeymoon, and taking an average 
specimen of husband and wife, look at them as they 
begin housekeeping. The flush of excitement is over, 
the rhapsodies of love-making are past, and they are 
settling down in the sober rounds of every-day life; 
the steady, lifelong journey on which they have entered. 
They have a cozy little home, plain, but comfortably 
furnished ; they have health and the means of success 
in life, so that, with industry and economy, they may 
get along prosperously. 

There is a freshness and novelty and excitement in 
the thought of a home of their own. If they are at all 
similar in taste, or, being dissimilar, have sense and 
principle enough to overcome the opposition, all may 
go well. But these are critical years, the first two or 



44 OUR OWN NEIGHBORHOOD, 

three years of married life, in which is wrapped up 
much of destiny. 

If foolish imaginings have led them to expect too 
much of each other, and the nice attention and bound- 
less devotion of courtship are succeeded by »elfish de- 
mands and exactions on one hand s , and selfish careless- 
ness on the other, it is not long until the spark of love 
is quenched, and the charm of home is lost. It is best 
to keep on courting, and to keep up polite attentions ; 
they ought to be worth as much after as before mar- 
riage ; and the great trouble is that familiarity breeds 
contempt, and strips away all the charm of the more 
distant view which was once so inspiring. But as yet 
we will suppose that all is love and peace. 

The wife makes home bright and cheerful ; the hus- 
band spends his evenings at home ; friends gladden 
them with visits ; and they share each other's joys and 
sorrows with mutual trust and sympathy. They come, 
in time, to know that holiest joy that the human heart 
is permitted to know this side of heaven, the joy of 
fatherhood and motherhood, for it is the holiest joy that 
is ever vouchsafed to mortals, in any earthly relation, to 
gaze on one's first born. Home is holier now, perhaps 
the holiest it will ever be ; for as cares increase, and 
toils increase, and trials increase, it is, I fear, the small- 
est number that learn how to employ them and control 
them to make home dearer and more delightful. The 
husband becomes absorbed in his calling, and has less 
time.to spend at home. There are lodges, and leagues, 
and meetings of various kinds to occupy his evenings, 
so that, in a little while, he is at home simply to eat 
and sleep ; and his wife is left to drudge in her monot- 
onous round with little association and less sympathy. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 45 

And if, under the pressure of weariness or feeble- 
ness, she wears a cloud on her brow when he comes 
home, or the baby is bawling lustily, or the supper is 
not quite ready, he is soon the most ill-used man in the 
world, and flies from home as soon as possible for 
some more desirable retreat. If his wife is blessed — as 
it is reported most of her sex are — with a tongue, and 
possesses the virtue of frankness, and has taken lessons 
in the school of Mrs. Caudle, she probably gives him a 
piece of her mind for her own relief. I am not suppos- 
ing an extreme case. I will not say they quarrel ; they 
only have a free expression of sentiment. But the 
charm is dissolved. The honeyed phrases of former 
times are succeeded by exceedingly plain and even 
severe utterances ; smiles have given way to tears and 
sulks; entreaties to commands, and requests to ex- 
actions. 

Their life is no longer in common. The wife learns 
to live within herself, and the husband within himself, 
or within some association outside of home. They 
both find that they are not very much married, and 
there succeeds the most hideous domestic skeleton — 
a heartless, cold, and utterly cheerless association, 
hidden away from the world for a time under the 
outside formalities and courtesies which make of life a 
living lie. 

Or, what is perhaps as often true, without any 
cause or intention of alienation, the husband and 
wife each becomes absorbed in a special line of 
duties and tastes, unaware of the divergence of 
their paths until it is too late. They started even ; 
but he, in his ambition to succeed, is toiling in 
his line, and mingling with men that lead his 



46 OUR OWN NEIGHBORHOOD, 

heart out in special paths of inquiry and effort. He 
rises, but he takes not his wife with him. He is not 
careful to have her share his thoughts and sympathies ; 
and in a few years he can not talk to her ; she does 
not understand him ; she has been going the same 
dreary round of toil and care, providing for his physical 
comfort, and he has been reading and studying, and 
rubbing against the world, until he is a polished and 
influential gentleman, and she is a timid, uncultivated, 
awkward woman. There is a great gulf between them. 
He begins to be ashamed of her — thinks he did not 
find his "affinity," married beneath him, etc. Not so ; 
she was his equal once, and he might have kept her 
so. He is only paying the penalty of his own neglect. 
Unless a woman is an outrageous termagant or a 
thorough-paced fool, if she has an ordinary amount of 
sense and a good heart, her husband can have her 
grow with him and rise with him, and have occasion to 
be proud of her in any circle into which he is fit to go 
himself. But now she must either sit down and pine 
in hopeless inferiority, or enter into another class of 
associations entirely different from his ; or, to escape 
from the intolerable burden of her loneliness and sor- 
row, run off with the first scapegrace that treats her 
kindly, and plunge into eternal disgrace.. There are 
thousands of brave, heroic hearts that are suffering in 
hell — even in splendid homes — for want of thoughtful 
sympathy and love ; and there are thousands of mur- 
derers who have never shed a drop of blood, but who, 
in their selfishness, and coldness, and haughtiness, and 
exactions, visit the horrors of a living death on the 
trusting hearts that they promised to love, honor and 
cherish all the days of their lives. And many of them 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 47 

are not aware of what they are doing until it is too 
late for remedy. 

As a general rule, men can not trust their wives too 
much, nor be too careful to keep them on their own 
level of life. 

Once in a while a man may be unfortunate enough 
to find himself married to a mere babbling, rattling 
fool, or a senseless creature of prodigality, who has to 
be watched, and restrained; but not oftener than 
women find themselves married to loonies, or what is 
worse, to incorrigible bears, whose only safe place is 
in the cage of a menagerie, or at the north pole among 
the icebergs. But these are the exceptional cases, 
which we do not now discuss. I say, as a general rule, 
woman can be trusted and improved, and is her 
husband's best counselor. Give her confidence ; ac- 
quaint her with your business, whatever its intricacies 
or perplexities ; familiarize her with your pursuits 
and your associations, and she will stand by you, 
and advise you, and uphold you, and suffer with you, 
as no other being can. It is said of Disraeli, that when 
starting for the parliament-house on one occasion, 
charged with a great speech, at a critical juncture, his 
wife, who was going with him, had her finger caught 
fast by the carriage door as the servant hurriedly shut 
it. She was aware of the importance of the crisis in 
parliament, and rather than divert her husband's atten- 
tention or cause him the least disturbance, she rode to 
the parliament-house with her finger held fast, endur- 
ing the most excruciating torture ; and he never knew 
it until the next day. 

That shows what a woman can do in a pinch. I 
would not like to answer for most women under such 



48 OUR OWN NEIGHBORHOOD, 

circumstances. But I will answer for most of them 
under ordinary circumstances, if you give them but 
fair dealing. Not only would they be faithful, but 
they would be serviceable. They may not know half 
as much as their husbands about business and profes- 
sional life ; but their intuitions are deeper and keener ; 
and they will read character, and judge of men (they 
can not be trusted to judge of each other), and see at a 
glance farther than most men can reason in an hour. 
If you ask them why? or how? they answer you as 
Shakespeare makes only his lady-characters answer: 
"I have none other than a woman's reason, I think 
It's so — because — I think it's so ! " 

It is not thinking at all, it is seeing; and often it is 
better than all the logic in the world. 

If I were going to seek after infallibility on earth, 
I would not seek it in an Ecumenical council of dreary 
old bachelors ; I would seek it in the intuitions of a 
pure-hearted woman, and especially of a wife. 

There is no greater wrong done in a home than to 
destroy the confidence and trust between husband and 
wife, parent and child. Faith, in nature, as in grace, 
underlies all peace and all goodness ; and when it is 
absent, no amount of works will justify us. Mr. Spur- 
geon says of a visit to Venice : 

On the island of Lido, within hail of Venice, one hears 
on the Sabbath a very heaven of music floating over the 
lagune from the church bells of " that glorious city in the 
sea." The atmosphere seems to ripple with silver waves 
akin to those which twinkle on the sea of glass before you. 
A mazy dance of sweet sounds bewilders you with delight; 
it is a mosaic of music, or, if you will, a lace-work of melody. 
One would not wish to lose a note, or hush the glorious 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 49 

clangor of a single bell. How changed it all is, when the 
gondolier's fleet oar has brought you close under the Cam- 
paniles', when you are gliding smoothly along those marvel- 
ous streets, where "the salt seaweed clings to the marble of 
the palaces." Then the booming of the bells, incessant, 
impetuous, thundering, garrulous, discordant, becomes an 
almost unbearable affliction. On your right a little noisy 
demon calls from the hollow of his cracked shrine in a voice 
dolefully monotonous, and yet actually piercing, awakening 
a whole kennel of similar spirits, each one more ill-condi- 
tioned than his brother; these, in turn, arouse a huge and 
monstrous Diabolus, who groans at you as if longing to 
grind your Protestant bones, and feed the departed souls of 
inquisitors with the dainty bread. Two or three sweet little 
bells cast in their dulcet notes, but the ear resents as an im- 
pertinence their unrequested addition to the deafening din; 
while worse than all, if perchance a moment's pause should 
occur, and the discordant and the booming noise-makers 
should rest, as though from sheer exhaustion, some miser- 
able cur of a bell close at hand is sure to yap out like a 
scalded puppy, to the utter despair of the wearied traveler. 

How true this often proves in the matters of which 
we are treating ! In the distance — during youth and 
courtship — the sound of marriage bells is heavenly, 
and we are drawn towards the scene of enchant- 
ment with eager steps ; but how often is it that "dis- 
tance lends enchantment to the view." A nearer 
approach reveals more of Dante's Inferno than of 
Milton's Paradise. 

But we must proceed. A few more years, and the 
children are growing rapidly towards manhood and 
womanhood. The father is too busy with the concerns 
of the public to care for them, and the mother is too 
much oppressed with her numerous and unceasing 
trials to be able to see to them. Yet their characters 



50 OUR OWN NEIGHBORHOOD, 

are really formed within the first seven years ! They 
must be packed off to school. The state is very kind 
to furnish a nursery and reformatory to which oppressed 
mothers can consign their turbulent youngsters for six 
hours of the day; and there are thousands that are 
sent to the schools for no other reason than to get rid 
of them in the house, and allow them to plague the 
teacher rather than the mother. Then for the balance 
of the day, if they are boys, they run the streets; 
gather at the depot, hang around bar-rooms, go to the 
circus, and learn to chew and smoke and swear and 
drink, and absorb the vulgarities of the street. If they 
are girls, they manage to spend as much time as possi- 
ble away from home — anywhere, everywhere ; if they 
can but escape the dreadful dullness and monotony of 
home-life. They come to look on home-life as a terri- 
ble necessity. Home is a place to eat, drink and 
sleep ; a place to be lectured in and flogged for misde- 
meanors ; a house of correction in which to be punished 
for their sins. All this while no confidence is estab- 
lished between parent and child ; no pains are taken to 
make home pleasanter than any other place ; no quiet 
hours of communion are spent together. There is no 
time. Even Sunday has no spare hours. There is so 
much to be done to save other people on that day, that, 
between church and Sunday-school and prayer meet- 
ings and singing meetings, no hour is left for home 
instruction. The best that can be done is to get the 
children washed and dressed for Sunday-school, and 
pack them off in the hope that the teacher will apply 
a spiritual scrubbing-brush and soap-suds to scrub 
out from their souls the stains and pollutions of the 
week. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 5 I 

The mischievous little rebels stand up and sing 
" I want to be an angel!" 

May be they do, but it is most likely the angel of the 
circus, flying around the ring on a galloping horse, 
performing strange evolutions for a gaping crowd. Can 
one hour of superficial Sunday-school instruction re- 
cover the soul from the folly and vulgarity and sin of a 
whole week ? Is the absence of the constant influence of 
purity and peace and love at home to be compensated by 
an hour of prayer and praise ? But in this way boys grow 
up and go to college ; a perilous thing for boys thus 
raised. The temptations of college life are numerous and 
powerful. A lad. who has been carefully and wisely 
trained at home, and who carries away with him pure 
and loving memories of parents, sisters, brothers and 
friends, may be safe, and be even the better for the 
vigorous conflict he is called to wage with evil. He 
will attract to himself congenial associates. But if he 
comes from such a home as we have been describing, 
and with such looseness of principle as must belong to 
such a training, woe betide him when he enters the 
wider circles of temptation, and becomes a prey to the 
glittering but ruinous seductions that draw him surely 
into the whirlpool of passion and sin. He is more than 
half ruined before he reaches manhood ; and goes out 
to society to become a drunkard, or a gambler, or a 
fast young man ; or at best to make his way through 
the world in hopeless mediocrity, bolstered up and 
watched and led by temperance societies and other 
benevolent associations. 

And the girls — they, too, are growing. The daugh- 
ter soon reaches an age when she must be sent off to 



52 OUR OWN NEIGHBORHOOD, 

that queen of humbugs, a modern, fashionable female 
boarding school. She goes in the chrysalis state, 
to be hatched into a gaudy butterfly. After a few- 
years she returns, chattering a little French, thrum- 
ming a piano with execrable accompaniment of operatic 
shrieks, doing a little embroidery, and wriggling all 
over with silly affectation. The best educated part 
of her is her feet and her fingers. She can sing, and 
she can dance; and she does sing and dance with 
untiring zeal ; and flirts, and coquettes, and throws her- 
self into a whirl of fashionable follies, thinking little of 
anything beyond dress, parties, and a beau. She under- 
stands nothing of herself, and nothing of other people, 
beyond a gay and gaudy exterior ; and knows no higher 
delight than to drink in the flatteries and devotions 
of the perfumed dandies that dance attendance on 
her. 

Do not blame her; she has no home, she has no 
father ; she has not more than half a mother in the hope- 
less slave who toils away in the chains of necessity, 
and knows not how to counsel her own child. It is 
natural she should be pleased with flatterers, and find 
comfort in the genial atmosphere of fashionable life. 
Directly she falls in love with a fortune, or with a suit 
of broadcloth. Her heart begins to thrill with a new 
sensation. Of course she must not say anything to 
father or mother about it ; that would never do. There 
has been established between them no confidence what- 
ever, and marriage is never talked of in the family except 
in a teasing way. Now when, above all other times, 
she needs counsel, and sympathy, and guidance, she is 
left to hide her feelings and conceal her wishes. What 
does she know of the man who seeks her hand and 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 53 

heart? He may be a scoundrel; he may be a wretched 
trifler, or mercenary, incapable of holy love. He may 
be of habits and tastes so at war with hers, that mar- 
ried life would be but a succession of horrible antago- 
nisms. He may be scrofulous; he may belong to a 
family tending to insanity ; he may be, worse than all 
this, meanly selfish and exacting and tyrannical. But 
she thinks nothing, knows nothing of all this. She is 
intoxicated with the charms of the exterior man. He 
is handsome, or smart, or witty, and he is said to be 
rich ; and so, without counsel or help, until it is too far 
gone, there is nothing to do but let them be married, 
or startle the town with a new elopement to some 
Gretna Green. So she goes from home under the 
guidance of a stranger, and begins a new life for which 
she is entirely unprepared. Ignorant of the anatomy 
and physiology of her own frame, ignorant of her own 
soul and of her own real character, at a period when 
new mysteries are revealing themselves in her nature 
and new duties are accumulating, she is left to grope 
and blunder in the most sad ignorance, until her own 
painful experience reveals herself to herself at the cost 
of a broken constitution and a despairing heart. She 
wakes up out of her dream, a prisoner and a bankrupt 
in health and peace. By the time she is thirty her 
beauty has faded : crowsfeet begin to reveal themselves ; 
her hair is getting gray, her teeth are gone, and she 
feels and talks old before the time for her womanly 
beauty and vigor to reach their climax. Do you think 
the picture over-drawn ? 

Happily, it is so ; for in many cases even blind for- 
tune is better to us than we deserve, and by the merest 
chance we often escape the legitimate results of our 



54 OUR OWN NEIGHBORHOOD, 

ignorance and folly ; yet there are tens of thousands in 
whose cases all that I have said, and a great deal more 
that I have not dared to say, is true ; and all for want 
of faithfulness to the duties of home. A recent work 
of travels in Hungary gives the following description of 
the education of young women in that country : 

"The eldest daughter, a charming girl of eighteen, might 
be said to possess all the qualifications, physical and mental, 
one could wish to find in a young woman of good position. 
To a ver}' sweet face, with clear, blooming complexion and 
beaming eyes, and a graceful figure, she added the charm of 
the most winning manners, while her conversation betokened 
high cultivation, whether in reading, language, or accom- 
plishments. We were suprised when her mother told us she 
had no longer any trouble with the menage, for that Illona 
took the entire charge of the household, and even gave an 
eye to the management of her younger brothers and sisters. 
'There is not,' she added, 'any department of needlework 
with which she is unacquainted, from darning a stocking or 
a table-cloth (so exquisitely that no one would detect the spot) 
to the choicest embroidery. In the kitchen/ she continued, 
' she is equally efficient, and, as soon as she heard you were 
coming this evening, she begged the cook to let her prepare 
every dish that was to appear. She understands making 
all kinds of pastry and preserves, and even the curing of 
bacon; and you must not think this is anything extraordi- 
nary — no Hungarian mother would consider that she had 
done her duty by her daughter if she had not thoroughly 
grounded her in all the knowledge she is likely to require as 
mistress of a family.' We heartily admired this sensible mode 
of training, and secretty wished that American mothers enter- 
tained similar ideas on the subject ; but could not help think- 
ing that such a training, useful as it is, must have interfered 
with the perfection which might have been attained by such 
a girl in the more elevated branches of her education. Any 
such doubts, however, were completely removed when, at 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 55 

her mother's desire, Illona opened the piano and played with 
her, some national duets, without notes, and with the most 
consummate taste and feeling. Our astonishment was not to 
end here, for we found that our fair young friend possessed 
an admirable talent for drawing, when she produced a port- 
folio of most spirited sketches from nature. Her French 
accent was excellent, and she spoke English with tolerable 
fluency, being also well acquainted with many of our authors, 
whether in prose or verse." 

But this was the result of a patient, religious, daily 
painstaking home education ; and such a complete 
blending of the practical and esthetical can never be 
had where the main burden of education is transferred 
to other hands. 

The great lesson we urge, then, is a reconstruction of 
our homes. 

The most alarming feature of the present time is the 
decay of home affections. It is seen in the growing 
popularity of divorces, the corruption of even the re- 
ligious conscience of the country on this question ; the 
prevalence of free love doctrines ; the public sympathy 
of clergymen, editors, authors, and women's rights 
women with those who set at naught the claims of mar- 
riage; the growing popularity of communism, which 
even in the name of religion breaks up the family and 
destroys the relation of husband and wife ; and more 
than all in the universal decadence of family discipline 
and conjugal and filial affection. 

We are disloyal to God and to our own nature when 
we neglect our homes. Better make less money, and 
have fewer cares, and live and die poor, leaving our 
children the legacy of well-developed natures and char- 
acters, than to toil and sweat to amass riches, and leave 
them to be squandered by a set of beings mentally and 



56 OUR OWN NEIGHBORHOOD, 

morally deformed, whose pathway to ruin is only made 
the shorter by the wealth they inherit. We must have 
more time for our families. We must have fewer meet- 
ings on Sunday. Better one good sermon, worth lis- 
tening to, and listened to with vigorous attention, than 
three half-prepared sermons, half listened to ; and bet- 
ter to have a little religion at home Sunday afternoon 
and evening, than this eternal running to prayer-meet- 
ing, and every other kind of gathering, better designed 
to cultivate spiritual drunkenness than sobriety and 
steady principle. 

When Davy Crockett told of all the great men at 
Washington and when they dined, he laid out so many 
dinners and so many hours, that there was no hour left 
for the President to dine. , * ' And when does the Presi- 
dent dine?" asked his hearers. "Oh ! " said Crockett, 
"the President doesn't dine till the next day ." And 
so with us — we fill up all the hours with church duties 
and public interests, until the duties of home are all 
put over until the next day. Whose heart has not been 
touched in reading Burns' Cotter's Saturday Night ? It 
is a beautiful picture. The children returning from 
their places of service to spend the hours of Saturday 
evening in their own humble cot : 

With joy unfeigned, brothers and sisters meet, 
And each for other's welfare kindly spiers ; 
The social hours, swift-winged, unnoticed fleet. 
Each tells the uncos that he sees or hears; 
The parents, partial, eye their hopeful years; 
Anticipation forward points the view. 
The mother, wi' her needle and her shears, 
Gars auld claes look amaist as weel 's the new ; 
The father mixes a' wi' admonition due. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 57 

And after the supper, and the familiar chats, and 
the fatherly counsel, comes the hour of devotion — 
when — 

Dundee's wild, warbling measures rise, 
Or plaintive Martyrs, worthy of the name, 
Or noble Elgin beets the heavenward flame — 
The sweetest far of Scotia's holy lays. 

And then the reading of the sacred page : 

Then kneeling down, to Heaven's eternal King 

The saint, the father, and the husband prays; 

Hope " springs exulting on triumphant wing," 

That thus they all shall meet in future days : 

There ever bask in uncreated rays ; 

No more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear, 

Together hymning their Creator's praise, 

In such society, yet still more dear; 

While circling Time moves round in an eternal sphere. 

Yet what the Scottish peasant could only have on 
Saturday night, we, in this blessed land, might have 
every night ; and if we had it, it would be better than 
Temperance Societies, or Free Masons', or Odd Fellows' 
Lodges, or Young Men's Christian Associations. It is 
the melancholy absence of such homes that renders 
these aids necessary. 

When Daniel Webster had commenced his college- 
life, he became exceedingly anxious that his brother, 
Ezekiel, should enjoy the same advantages, and spoke 
to his father about it. The father was possessed of 
small means — the farm was mortgaged for Daniel's edu- 
cation: ''I live for my children," said he, "and will 
do anything ; but your mother and sister are the most 
interested persons; you had better see them." They 
at once consented. "But," said the old man to 



58 OUR OWN NEIGHBORHOOD, 

his wife, "the farm is already mortgaged, and this new 
scheme will take all we have. " '* Let it go, " said she ; 
" I will trust the children." And her trust was not in 
vain. She lived to see her son Daniel rising into 
eminence, and found a home for her old age under her 
children's care. Could a life-time of advocacy of 
politics have done for the country what she did in 
giving to the Union the mighty defender of the Con- 
stitution? 

" Home, sweet home; " what a sacred thing it is ! 
Husband, wife ; the most intimate and hallowed of 
earthly unions ; the most expressive type, in its close- 
ness and spirituality, of Christ and his Church. 

Father, mother — the nearest approach to creator- 
ship known among creatures ; authors of beings des- 
tined to live forever. Son, daughter — a new edition 
of life ; a reproduction of one's own life, in the in- 
nocence of babyhood, to be moulded and trained for 
the solemn responsibilities of life here, and the tre 
mendous realities of the endless life hereafter. Brother, 
sister — sharing the same blood, and bearing the same 
image, able to love without stint, and to be fond with- 
out censure, and lending to each other's lives, in beauti- 
ful complement, the strength and courage that a de- 
pendent nature needs ; the sweetness and gentleness 
that can subdue a rough and stormy nature into quiet- 
ness. What, this side of heaven, should be so dearly 
prized ? The baby in the cradle ; the aged grandfather 
or grandmother in the old arm-chair ; the parents in 
the strength and glory of manhood and womanhood ; 
the young man rising into the dignity of his nature ; 
the maiden blooming into the grace and sweetness of 
womanly perfection, the pride and joy of all hearts ; 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 59 

the merry voice of younger children ; the laugh and 
romp and clatter of unembarrassed childhood ; the gay 
song of happy spirits ; the gush of music, the flashes 
of wit, the clashing of interest, in which are learned 
self-denial and subjection ; the cheerful toils, the 
solemn worship, the steady development of the mys- 
teries and glories of growing natures ; yes, and the 
sickness, and the sorrows, and the deaths, all make up a 
discipline and an education and a history whose memo, 
ries will be as lasting as eternity. For, though death 
breaks the circle, they who are taken are golden links 
in the chain that binds the living to the unseen home 
beyond. Wordsworth has a beautiful little poem, in 
which he asks a little girl how many sisters and 
brothers are in the family, and she answers : 

"Seven are we; 
And two of us at Conway dwell, 
And two are gone to sea ; 

Two of us in the church-yard lie — 

My sister and my brother ; 
And, in the church-yard cottage, I 

Dwell near them with my mother. 

"'How many are you then,' said I, 
'If they two are in heaven?' 
The little maiden would reply, 
*0 master, we are seven.' 

"' But they are dead ; those two are dead; 
Their spirits are in heaven ; ' 
'T was throwing words away : for still 
The little maid would have her will, 
And said, 'Nay, we are seven! " 

Yes, better to sit with what remain about the old 
hearthstone, and feel that it is still one family — those 



60 OUR OWN NEIGHBORHOOD, 

who are there, and those who are out in the busy 
world, and those who are in heaven — all one, and all 
to meet again. That old hearthstone is watched by 
the eyes that were closed in death ; and they who have 
gone out into the rough world visit it in their prayers 
and tears a thousand times, and its loving memories 
hold them from evil more than all else in earth. 
Whether here or in heaven, a mother's love is still 
their choicest treasure, and a father's example and 
counsels their guiding-star. And when, one by one, 
grandsire and babe, and father and mother, and brother 
and sister, all have gone away from the old homestead, 
and passed over the river to the City of God, heaven 
will be no strange place to them. They had it here — 
in miniature ; heaven will be but the fullness of that 
holiness and love and order and peace and beauty 
and loving fellowship which made the home on earth 
the earnest of the everlasting home. 



THE PROGRESSIVE DEVELOPMENT OF 
RELIGION. 

It is a question often asked and seldom satisfactorily- 
answered : If man needed a Saviour, why was not a 
Saviour sent immediately when man sinned ? Why a 
delay of four thousand years ? And why, meanwhile, 
did God bestow his grace upon one insignificant nation, 
and leave the great mass of mankind to perish in their 
sins? 

Not only does the unbeliever find food for cavil 
here, but many Christians are perplexed over a problem 
apparently too full of difficulties to allow of satisfactory 
solution. Hence the Old Testament is to them largely 
a sealed book. They find little that is edifying in its 
records of plagues, pestilences, wars and revolutions, 
individual and national sins and apostasies, curious 
ritual, and vague prophecies, while it looks to them as 
if this might all have been spared if the Saviour had at 
once appeared when man became a sinner, and granted 
to him at first the full blessings of that salvation of 
which we learn in the New Testament four thousand 
years later. 

We do not propose to treat this as a curious ques- 
tion, to be solved for the amusement of speculative 
minds. We regard it as a question rightfully demand- 
ing consideration, and we attempt to answer it because 
we think the answer may relieve many minds of painful 
doubts, and impart clearer and more satisfactory views 
of the character and scope of the Bible as a revelation 
from God to man. 

61 



62 DEVELOPMENT OF RELIGION, 

Let us say, however, as preliminary to our answer 
to this grave question, that if we had no other answer 
to make, we could say that the divine proceeding, in 
this case, is in harmony with all we know through 
other sources of God's method of working. While we 
may not (and, for myself, I certainly do not) admit any 
such theory of evolution as excludes creative power 
and a personal God, it is still evident that within cer- 
tain limits the law of progressive development — of 
evolution, if you will — is operative in the physical 
universe. What geology has unfolded of a sublime 
series of creations and destructions in the history of 
our earth ; what astronomy has revealed in support of 
the nebular theory, and the just analogies of nature 
which proceed from this starting point, render it prob- 
able that the law of progressive development pervades 
the universe. However this may be, we are certain in 
regard to its operation in and on our own globe, in the 
realms of matter and of mind. Life is growth, de- 
velopment from a germ of existence through succes- 
sive stages of infancy, childhood, youth, to manhood's 
perfection. If we can not tell why, we are still com- 
pelled to accept the truth that so it is. The scientist, 
in exploring the fields of nature, finds that, in build- 
ing a globe like that on which we live, God has 
patiently progressed with his work through long 
geological periods. The man of science may not be 
able to tell why. He may conceive the possibility of 
divine power accomplishing such a work instantane- 
ously ; but he is compelled to admit the fact of pro- 
gressive development, whether he understands its 
philosophy or not. The most he can say is, that it is 
in accordance with the principle of divine movements 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 63 

— the law of divine action — that is everywhere trace- 
able in God's works. 

Now, Jesus teaches us that the same law holds in 
the operation of the spiritual universe. "So is the 
kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the 
ground, and should sleep and rise, night and day, and 
the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not 
how; for the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself— 
first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in 
the ear. But when the fruit is brought forth, imme- 
diately he putteth in the sickle, because the harvest is 
come." (Mark iv. 26-29). Thus we are taught that 
the laws of the kingdom of grace are analogous to those 
of the kingdom of nature ; that religion does not run 
counter to the established laws of matter or of mind ; 
that the volumes of Nature and Revelation are from 
the same author, in the same hand-writing; and that 
the same principle of rational investigation which we 
carry with us in the interpretation of the former, are 
equally legitimate and necessary in the interpretation 
of the latter. 

So, if we could make no other reply to the question, 
"Why did four thousand years elapse before the 
Saviour appeared? why for two thousand years was 
the favor of God confined to a single family and 
nation, while all the rest of mankind were left to 
perish in their sins?" we would answer by asking 
questions in return : Why does this law of progressive 
development obtain at all ? Why must man begin in 
puling infancy, and grow into manhood, slowly de- 
veloping not only his physical frame, but his mental 
and moral character likewise ? Why is not knowledge 
flashed instantaneously into the mind, rather than left 



64 DEVELOPMENT OF RELIGION, 

to be acquired slowly and painfully through a thousand 
struggles and repeated failures ? Why must we have 
toys for infancy, and object-lessons for childhood, and 
carry the learner patiently through elementary in- 
struction before he can grasp broad generalizations, or 
master the mysteries of any science ? Why do nations 
grow, and ages move in cycles? Why did nations, 
without a revelation from God, struggle so long in vain 
with the problems of duty and destiny ? At the very 
time when this objection was most loudly urged, un- 
believers were looking to geology, to find such revela- 
tions in the stone-book as would forever silence the 
pretensions of the Bible. But, lo ! when these revela- 
tions were made, the same lesson of progressive 
development was written on every page ; the same 
calmness and patience were everywhere traceable in 
the Divine Architect's plan of building a world. If we 
were able to say no more, we could be content in say- 
ing that this gradual and patient unfolding of redemp- 
tion is of a piece with the gradual unfolding of God's 
purpose in the realms of nature. 

We are far from saying, however, that we are 
ignorant of any reason for this slow progression. Nay, 
we see reasons for it in redemption, that we could not 
plead in behalf of progressive development in creation. 
It is consistent with our best ideas of omnipotence 
that a world or a universe of matter should be spoken 
into instant perfection of existence. But it is not con- 
sistent with our knowledge of the rational nature of 
man that omnipotence should instantaneously redeem 
it from error and guilt. Omnipotence might, perhaps, 
instantaneously annihilate such a nature, but certainly 
could not instantaneously save it; because the salva- 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 6$ 

tion of a rational nature implies that the nature itself 
desires to be saved ; that it is weary of sin ; is con- 
scious of its curse; has trust in a Saviour, and peni- 
tentially returns to submission to the will of God. 
These are not the results of mere omnipotence ; some 
of them are results which can only flow from man's 
own experience. To know the whole bitterness and 
curse of sin, to know one's ov/n inability to redeem 
himself from its power and its guilt, to attain to such a 
knowledge of human helplessness and hopelessness 
that a sinning race shall be willing to come, sin-sick 
and heart-broken, to cast themselves imploringly on 
the mercy of God ; these are results which could only* 
be reached through long and varied experiences, 
through repeated demonstrations in human history of 
man's depravity and helplessness, and of God's com- 
passion and mercy. 

Salvation is not a mechanical nor an arbitrary thing. 
It involves the restoration of the rebellious soul to 
loyalty, to delight in and fellowship with God. This, 
in its turn, involves choice on the part of the sinner, a 
voluntary turning from falsehood to truth, from sin to 
holiness. No such voluntary turning can take place 
until sinners learn enough of the odious curse of sin to 
hate it, and are convinced of the beauty of holiness, so 
as to desire it ; nor can it be until they have become so 
satisfied of their own impotence as to be willing to 
accept the boon of salvation at the hands of another. 
They must learn in the school of experience. Time 
must be given for sin to develope itself in the history 
of the soul, and for men to try their own remedial 
schemes. Only when, like the prodigal, they have 
wasted their substance, exhausted their resources, and 



66 DEVELOPMENT OF RELIGION, 

feel the pressure of utter despair, will they come to 
themselves and say, " I will arise and go to my Father." 
It required ages for the needful experiments of sinful 
man in government, philosophy and religion, before the 
need of salvation could be suitably realized. We must 
regard the ages preceding the advent of the Messiah as 
given up to the various nations for experiment, until 
they should weary of their vain inventions. Meanwhile, 
development of salvation could only keep pace with 
the development of human nature and the attainments 
of human experience. God's revelations must adapt 
themselves to the circumstances and capacities of the 
race he seeks to save. 

That we are not dealing in mere imaginations in thus 
stating the case will be evident when we mention two 
facts. First, the scriptures positively and frequently 
state that God proceeded according to "an eternal 
purpose " in the redemption of man. He wrought ac- 
cording to a settled plan. Second, in developing this 
purpose we are expressly informed that he gave men 
up for a time to experiment for themselves and learn 
through experience what they would learn in no other 
way. Paul says, that as men " did not like to retain 
God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a rep- 
robate mind" (Rom. i. 28); and that "in times past 
he suffered all nations to walk in their own ways" 
(Acts xiv. 16), yet not leaving himself without witness. 

Let us now glance — for the limits of this address 
will allow of no more than a glance — at the unfolding 
of Jehovah's eternal purpose. We pass by the period 
before the flood, as being complete in itself, and as re- 
quiring a consideration much more extended than could 
be given to it here. We only remark concerning it, 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 6j 

that it furnishes a terrible demonstration of the inevit- 
able tendency of man, separated from God and left to 
himself, to drift into sin and crime, and sink into hope- 
less depravity, until his presence on earth is an unmiti- 
gated curse. The utter failure of antediluvian attempts 
to control human nature and govern society is told in 
the flood that swept an incorrigible world into destruc- 
tion. 

But coming to the re-opening of the earth and the 
beginning of a new experiment with human nature, we 
have already seen that it was a part, and a necessary 
part, of the divine proceeding to allow the race, in the full 
light of the tremendous failure of the past, to renew 
its efforts at self-guidance and self-regeneration. Mighty 
civilizations were developed on the plains of Assyria, 
and the march of civilization went thence to Egypt, to 
Greece and to Rome, recording successive and stupen- 
dous efforts of man in his departures from God, to con- 
struct religious philosophies and governments that 
should effect the regeneration of the race. They started 
not without some capital. They took, in the treasures 
of tradition from the other side of the flood, a consider- 
able portion of goods from the Father's house, when 
they went forth on their prodigal career. They were 
not destitute of genius or talents ; as glorious minds as 
God has ever given to the race he gave, ever and anon, 
to those ancient nations and peoples, that they might 
not lack any capacity that human nature was capable of 
possessing. It ended in utter failure. There was great 
military skill ; there was sometimes great statesman- 
ship ; there were reared great architectural monuments 
of taste, genius and labor ; there were immortal 
triumphs of art wrought by pencil and chisel ; oratory 



68 DEVELOPMENT OF RELIGION, 

and poetry that can never die have come down to us 
from those times, and the world echoes yet with speech 
and music and song from hearts and lips inspired with 
genius that men call godlike. Science made discoveries, 
and art wrought inventions, and philosophy taught 
beautiful and wonderful things ; but sin still held sway, 
and no human genius or skill could break its power, or 
unlock the awful mysteries of death. Every generation 
sought to improve by the struggles and failures of its 
predecessors, until human wisdom was taxed to its 
utmost, and the world was bankrupt alike in faith and 
hope. 

Meanwhile, Jehovah selected one man, from whom 
to raise up a nation that should be a depository of his 
counsels, and through which he could keep up com- 
munication with, and operate upon, the apostate na- 
tions of mankind. It was not an arbitrary favoritism 
selecting Abraham and the Jewish nation to be saved, 
while the great mass of mankind were left to perish in 
their sins ; but a selection mercifully made, in behalf of 
the apostate nations, that Jehovah might, through this 
elect nation, watch over them, communicate with them, 
and rebuke and chasten them, an d prepare the way for 
their return when, sin-sick and despairing, with sub- 
stance wasted in riotous living, and reduced to swine's 
food, they should desire to come back to their Father's 
house. 

With these objects in view, this elect nation was 
located in a central position, in a territory where they 
were shut in by sea, mountains and desert, from the 
rest of the world, that they might be a separate people, 
and yet bordered by the great highway between Egypt 
and Assyria, the two great ancient empires of heathen- 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 6g 

ism, and on the shore of the Mediterranean, in close 
neighborhood with Phoenicia and the great commercial 
emporiums, Tyre and Sidon. If I may be allowed a 
homely illustration, I will say that during these prepara- 
tory ages the world was going to school to God, and 
the Jewish nation was the blackboard in tiiis school, on 
which God wrote the lessons which the world was to 
learn. The knowledge of Jehovah, the one living and 
true God, in opposition to idolatry with all its hideously 
corrupting and degrading influences ; the knowledge of 
sin and redemption, of truth and righteousness, and 
holiness ; the knowledge of a coming Redeemer, the 
world's Saviour — this it was the mission of this chosen 
people to receive, preserve and communicate in such 
ways and at such times as divine wisdom and provi- 
dential unfoldings should indicate. Hence their loca- 
tion in the geographical center of the earth, as then 
known. Hence God's movements, through them, on 
the most powerful and enlightened nations of antiquity. 
It is worthy of remark that Jehovah's movements were 
upon the great centers of learning, religion and author- 
ity, the radiating centers of the world. Through Israel 
he moved on Egypt and her idols, and radiated thence 
over the earth the knowledge of the true God; and 
similarly on Nineveh, Babylon, Ecbatana, Susa, and 
thence on all the provinces of vast empires. The 
books of Esther, Ezra, Nehemiah and Daniel, as well 
as many other portions of the Old Testament, show 
how, through the Jews, alike in their victories and de- 
feats, as a powerful nation at home, or as helpless cap- 
tives abroad, knowledge was disseminated, sin de- 
nounced, idolatry rebuked, justice asserted, mercy dis- 
played, hopes of a coming deliverer awakened, until to 



JO DEVELOPMENT OF RELIGION, 

a much greater extent than a superficial reader ol the 
Bible would suppose, the leaven of divine truth was 
deposited with the nations. Jewish and heathen authors 
attest that before the Messiah appeared a general ex- 
pectation of a Divine Redeemer had been awakened ; 
so that Jesus was, in a very large sense, "the desire 
of all nations." 

What had been the result of human experiments in 
Assyria, Egypt, Greece and Rome? We speak of 
moral and religious results. Not only among Asiatics 
and Egyptians, but also among Greeks and Romans, 
the result was utter failure. Read the first chapter of 
Romans, if you wish to know, and remember that 
heathen authors give even a blacker picture of the 
moral and religious condition of the Gentile world. 
' 'Added to a sensuality more vile and abominable than 
it is lawful to describe, society was frozen into despair 
by atheistic fatalism. Among educated Romans of 
that period, the prevailing tone of feeling touching 
everything spiritual and divine was one of gloomy 
skepticism. Their culture had far outgrown the popu- 
lar religion. No man of sense pretended to believe in 
the gross mythology which still served to amuse and 
enslave the vulgar. The best minds of the times had 
broken loose from the old moorings of superstition, 
and were afloat in a fathomless sea of doubt." 

We quote but one evidence of this, as indicative of 
the general sentiment. It is from the elder Pliny, as 
quoted by Neander in the introduction of his Church 
History, and expresses the utter helplessness and hope- 
lessness in which these prodigious and long-continued 
efforts at self-illumination and self-control had landed 
even the best of the race. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. Jl 

"All religion," Pliny says, "is the offspring of 
necessity, weakness and fear. What God is — if indeed 
Hebe anything distinct from the world — it is beyond 
the compass of man's understanding to know. But it is 
a foolish delusion which has sprung from human weak- 
ness and human pride, to imagine that such an infinite 
Spirit would concern himself with the petty affairs of 
men. 

"It is dificult to say whether it might not be bet- 
ter to be wholly without religion, than to have one of 
this kind, which is a reproach to its object. The 
vanity of man, and his insatiable longing after ex- 
istence, have led him to dream of a life after death. 
A being full of contradictions, he is the most wretched 
of creatures, since the other creatures have not wants 
transcending the bounds of their nature. Man is full 
of desires and wants that reach to infinity, and can 
never be satisfied. His nature is a lie, uniting the 
greatest poverty with the greatest pride. Among these 
so great evils, the best thing which God has bestowed 
on man is the power to take his own life." 

How perfectly this fills up the picture outlined by 
Paul: "Having no hope, and* without God in the 
world." The prodigal has wasted his substance, and 
is down among the swine, feeding on husks. Nay, 
worse than the prodigal in the parable, he has lost all 
faith in a father, all knowledge of a father's house. It 
is time for the Saviour to come and seek the lost. 

We can now take in something of the force of the 
expression, " the fullness of time." "When the full- 
ness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son." 
"The fullness of time" is* indicated by the following 
particulars : 



72 DEVELOPMENT OF RELIGION, 

1. Sin had been allowed full development. Its bit- 
ter and inevitable curse had followed men in all coun- 
tries. The terrible plague-spot had made its appear- 
ance everywhere. No class was exempt, no individual 
was free from the malady. Everywhere and always it 
was a poison in the cup of life, and its effects were 
deadly. Its bitter fruits in every kind of disorder, 
pollution, crime, outrage and suffering entered into all 
experience, and reddened every page of human history 
with blood, or blackened it with iniquity. 

2. The different races of men had experimented to 
weariness in vain effort to save themselves. This had 
required time, and at no time short of this had these 
experiments landed the race in so thorough a despair. 

3. The Jews had fulfilled their mission, both as a 
bulwark against idolatry in their national capacity, and 
as missionaries to carry revelations of God among the 
nations. Alike in their high national prosperity, when, 
in league with Tyre, they rushed out over the seas in 
commercial enterprise ; and in their captivities and dis- 
persions, when Babylon, Nineveh, Ecbatana, Alexan- 
dria, and other great seats of empire and of learning, 
became centers of radiation for the truth this people 
had in keeping, they fulfilled their wonderful mission 
in preparing the way for the coming of the Messiah. 
They came into contact with the political, commercial 
and literary potencies of the different ages, under all 
the great dynasties of ancient times. As a specimen 
of the work providentially accomplished by them, in 
addition to all we have referred to, let us mention the 
translation of the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek, at 
Alexandria, more than two centuries before the coming 
of the Christ. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 73 

"It was," says Thomas DeQuincey, "an advan- 
tage, of a rank rising to providential, that such a 
cosmopolitan version of the Hebrew sacred writings 
should have been made at a moment when a rare con- 
currence of circumstances happened to make it possi- 
ble ; such as, for example, a king both learned in his 
tastes and liberal in his principles of religious tolera- 
tion ; a language — the Greek — which had already be- 
come, what for many centuries it continued to be, a 
common language of communication for the learned 
of the whole civilized world, viz. : Greece, the shores 
of the Euxine, the whole of Asia Minor, Syria, Egypt, 
Carthage, and the dependencies of Carthage; finally, 
and above all, Rome — then beginning to loom up on 
the western horizon, together with all the dependencies 
of Rome, and, briefly, every state and city that 
adorned the imperial islands of the Mediterranean, or 
that glittered like gems in that vast belt of land, 
roundly speaking, one thousand miles in average 
breadth, and in circuit running up to five thousand 
miles. . . . Such was the boundless domain which 
this extraordinary act of Ptolemy suddenly threw open 
to the literature and spiritual revelations of a little, 
obscure race, nestling in a little angle of Asia, scarcely 
visible as a portion of Syria, buried in the broad 
shadows thrown out on one side by the great and 
ancient settlements on the Nile, and on the other by 
the vast empire that for thousands of years occupied 
the Tigris and the Euphrates. In the twinkling of an 
eye, at a sudden summons from the Orient, gates are 
thrown open which have an effect corresponding in 
grandeur to the effect that would arise from the 
opening of a ship-canal across the Isthmus of Darien, 



74 DEVELOPMENT OF RELIGION, 

viz.: the introduction to each other, face to face, of 
two separate infinities. Such a canal would suddenly 
lay open to each other the two great oceans of one 
planet, while the act of translating into Greek from 
Hebrew — that is, transferring out of a mysterious 
cypher, as little accessible as Sanscrit, and which never 
would be more accessible through any worldly attrac- 
tions of alliance with power and the civil grandeur of 
commerce — out of this darkness into the golden light 
of a language, the most beautiful, the most honored 
among men, and the most widely diffused through a 
thousand years to come, had the immeasurable effect 
of throwing into the great crucible of human specula- 
tion, even then beginning to boil and to overflow, that 
mightiest of all elements for exalting the chemistry of 
philosophy — grand and for the first time adequate, 
conceptions of the Deity. . . . And considering the 
activity of this great commercial city and port, which 
was meant to act and did act as a center of communi- 
tion between the East and the West, it is probable that 
a far greater effect was produced by the Greek transla- 
tion of the Jewish Scriptures, in the way of preparing 
the mind of nations for the apprehension of Christianity 
than has ever been distinctly recognized." (Theol. 
Essays, Vol. I., pp. 146-147). 

It is no longer a wonder that Josephus, Suetonius 
and Tacitus should agree in saying that, according to 
the decrees of fate in the sacred books, mankind were 
taught to look to the time of the appearance of Jesus 
for the coming of a great Deliverer. The bitter ex- 
periences of the race, and the widely spread prophecies 
of the Jewish Scriptures, combined to make him "the 
desire of all nations." Just here, to complete this 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 75 

phase of the subject, it may be well to quote from 
Neander a short paragraph : 

11 While it was necessary that the influence of Juda- 
ism should spread into the heathen world, in order to 
prepare the way and open a point of communication 
for Christianity, so was it needful also that the stern 
and repulsive rigidity of Judaism should be softened 
and expanded by the elements of Hellenic culture, in 
order to adapt it to embrace the new truths which the 
gospel was to exhibit. The three great historical 
nations had, each in its own peculiar way, to cooperate 
in preparing the soil in which Christianity was to be 
planted — the Jews on the side of the religious element ; 
the Greeks on the side of science and art ; the Romans, 
as masters of the world, on the side of the political ele- 
ment. When the fullness of the time was come, and 
Christ appeared — when the goal of history had been 
reached — then it was that through them, and by the 
power of the spirit that proceeded from him by the 
might of Christianity, all the threads of human de- 
velopment, which had hitherto been kept apart, were 
to be brought together and interwoven into one work." 
(Ch. Ant, Int., p. 6, Bonn's Ed.) 

4. The Greek was the language of the civilized 
world when Jesus came. The Roman empire, stretch- 
ing from the Euphrates to the German ocean, and from 
the Danube and the Rhine to the cataracts of the Nile, 
the African deserts and Mount Atlas, tolerated all 
religions at all compatible with civil ordeir, unified as 
far as possible all interests, threw up great military 
highways in all its provinces, and in preparing to pre- 
serve and maintain its own imperial sway, prepared the 
way for the heralds of the cross, and brought the main 



?6 DEVELOPMENT OF RELIGION, 

portions of the human family within reach of the re- 
generating influences of the truth and grace of God. 

Thus it is apparent that Jesus came in the fullness 
of time. All the events of time were divinely ordered 
with reference to this great consummation. The revela- 
tions made to the Jews, and through them to the world, 
were arranged in their development and dissemination 
with reference to the same event. " Christ was placed 
midmost in the world's history ; and in that central 
position he towers like some vast mountain to heaven, 
the farther slope stretching backward toward the crea- 
tion, the hither slope toward the consummation of all 
things. The ages before look to him with prophetic 
gaze ; the ages since behold him by historic faith ; by 
both he is seen in common, as ' the brightness if the 
Father's glory/ and the unspeakable gift of God to the 
race." 

We submit, in conclusion, the following reflec- 
tions : 

1. The Old Testament is not a tangled web of un- 
meaning tradition and prophecy, but a consistent and 
intelligible unfolding of Jehovah's "eternal purpose" 
in the redemption of our race. This purpose, like a 
golden thread, stretches over all the ages, and on it are 
strung the revelations that shine more and more 
brightly unto the perfect day. 

2. The Old Testament must be studied in this light, 
not as the revealed gospel of God's grace for the nations, 
for this is found only in the New; but as presenting the 
seed-sowing of the divine purposes, and the growth of 
the blade and the formation of the ear, of that plant of 
salvation of which we have the ripe grain in the ear, 
and the blessed harvest, in the New Testament. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. JJ 

3. We must therefore deal with the language of the 
Old Testament as with the language of infancy and 
childhood. Its anthropomorphisms, its object lessons, 
and the utter absence of scientific conceptions and 
expressions, are just what we have a right to expect in 
view of its character as a preparatory and progressive 
revelation. How absurd to expect the language of the 
conceptions of modern science in a revelation like that 
of Genesis for the time when it was written, and the 
object had in view in writing it. How absurd, even 
now, would it be to write a divine revelation in the 
technical language of sciences whose nomenclatures 
are constantly varying as they enlarge their discoveries 
and revolutionize their theories. 

4. We discover the same law of progressive devel- 
opment in the spiritual as in the material realm. That 
which is first in intention is last in execution, and all 
the successive steps must be studied in view of the final 
consummation. Thus viewed, we shall not regard the 
Jews as elected by God to eternal life, and all divine 
sympathies concentrated upon that insignificant nation 
in that diminutive territory, while all the race beside 
was left to perish ; but we shall behold a world-wide 
purpose and world-wide benevolence in the selection 
of one nation to serve God's purposes in behalf of all 
nations, and shall hold it true, then as now, that "in 
every nation, he that fears God and works righteousness 
is accepted of him." 

5. The New Testament is the complete revelation 
of that which in the Old is but dimly and partially 
unfolded. "God who at sundry times," etc. There 
is indeed a progressive development of truth, even in 
the New Testament, of which we can not now speak. 



78 DEVELOPMENT OF RELIGION. 

But taken as a whole, it is "the bright consummate 
flower" ot heavenly wisdom and grace. The secrets 
kept hid from ages and from generations are here re- 
vealed, the things which eye had not seen nor ear heard, 
neither had they entered into the heart of man, are now 
made known by the Spirit; even V the deep things of 
God," and the high and the broad things of his redeem- 
ing grace and mercy. And with these final revelations 
of heaven's grand and gracious purposes respecting 
humanity in our hands, standing in the full light of the 
beams of the Sun of Righteousness, it may be said to us 
with even more emphasis than belonged to their original 
utterance: " Blessed are your eyes, for they see; and 
your ears, for they hear ; for I say unto you that many 
prophets and righteous men desired to see the things 
that you see, and did not see them ; and to hear the 
things that you hear, and did not hear them." 



f I 



OPPORTUNITY AND OPPOSITION. 

OR, SEASONS OF ADVANTAGE ALSO SEASONS OF PERIL. 

An Address Delivered before the Ohio Christian Missionary 
Society, at Dayton, Ohio, May 23, 1871. 

"For a great and effectual door is opened unto me; and there are 
many adversaries." — I. Cor. xvi. 9. 

In scripture style, and indeed in classic style, door, 
in its metaphorical use, often signifies an opportunity. 
Thus (Acts xiv. 27) Paul and Barnabas, on returning 
form their first missionary tour, related to the church in 
Antioch "what things God did by them, and that he 
had opened a door of faith for the Gentiles." This 
does not mean, as many have supposed, that faith was 
the door through which the Gentiles entered into the 
church ; but simply that God had given them an oppor- 
tunity to believe, through the preaching of Paul and 
Barnabas. Again, "when I came to Troas, to preach 
Christ's gospel, and a door was opened unto me of the 
Lord "(II. Cor. ii. 12) — that is, a good opportunity was 
offered to preach the gospel. And to the Colossians 
he says: "Pray for us, that God would open to us a 
door of utterance, to speak the mystery of Christ " (Col. 
iv. 3) — that is, an opportunity to utter the word. And 
to the church in Philadelphia, He "who opens and 
none can shut, and shuts and none can open" says: 
"I have set before thee an open door, which po one is 
able to shut" (Rev. iii. 7, 8) — I have made an opportu- 
nity of deliverance from thy adversaries, and an occa- 
sion to do good in my service. 



SO OPPORTUNITY AND OPPOSITION, 

According to our text, an unusual opportunity was 
afforded at Ephesus for preaching the gospel; it is 
called a great opportunity, in reference to its extent, and 
effectual in regard to the effectiveness of the labor be- 
stowed. 

We learn from all these texts that in preaching the 
gospel success depends much on the providential open- 
ings that are granted. While the means divinely or- 
dained for the world's salvation are always the same, 
and the gospel is as much the power of God at one 
time as at another, so far as its essential efficacy is con- 
cerned ; yet it does not always produce good results, 
because the means of access to the hearts of men are 
not at all times equal. It is not the gospel in a book, 
or in the mind of the preacher, that is the power of God 
to salvation; but the gospel in the sinner's heart, 
understood, believed, and accepted. But the means of 
access to the individual heart, and to the hearts of a 
whole community, are no part of the gospel. They 
furnish a channel through which that power flows. 
Power, even to almightiness, may be locked up in the 
gospel ; but it is just equal to no power at all, until it 
is brought to bear on the sinner for whose salvation it 
is intended. It must, in some way, be transferred to 
his mind, and heart, and conscience ; and in effecting 
this transfer much depends on the door of opportunity 
that may be opened. The state of the individual mind, 
the state of the public mind ; the influences that may 
hold up or cast down ancient prejudices ; that may 
carnalize the tastes of a population so as to destroy all 
desire after spiritual things, or blast that carnality by 
terrible experiences that set all hearts to hungering and 
thirsting after righteousness ; that may lead a political 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 8 1 

power to prohibit the preaching of the gospel, or to 
allow the liberty of speech ; that hold up a system of 
error or imposture in a strength that defies all opposi- 
tion, or, in a particular juncture, reveal its untrust- 
worthiness and hideousness so as to cause a decay of 
public confidence or a revolt of public sentiment — these 
have much to do with the matter of the gospel's suc- 
cess. Hence, the success of the gospel is dependent 
on divine providence; and its success is therefore a 
subject of prayer. God raises up and casts down men 
and nations, grants prosperity to blind and hardened 
men, and sends adversity to open their eyes and soften 
their hearts. The winds and waves, the treasures of 
rain and hail, and thunder and lightning, the caterpillar, 
the palmer-worm and the locust ; war, famine, pesti- 
lence; commercial prosperity and disaster, and all 
other agencies and instrumentalities that affect the con- 
dition of society, and move on the hearts of men for sal- 
vation or destruction, are at his command. He opens, 
and none can shut ; he shuts, and none can open. 

This suggests a truth of the greatest possible 
moment. The success of the gospel is not simply a 
question of ways and means of our creation or at our 
disposal. The gospel may have in it — as it has — all 
the saving power necessary for its object ; we may 
have all the means necessary for its promulgation — 
eloquent preachers, learned advocates, powerful writers, 
men and money, members, social position, and all else 
that wise policy or worldly prudence could suggest ; 
and yet, if the door is not opened, if God open not 
the way of access to the hearts of men, vain is wealth, 
and learning, and skill, and system, and social influence ; 
and vain, too, is gospel truth and grace. I apprehend 



82 OPPORTUNITY AND OPPOSITION, 

that much of the controversy on spiritual influence 
would cease, if parties understood each other. I am 
inclined to think that what others call the work of the 
Holy Ghost we call Divine Providence ; and that the 
difference is about the name rather than about the thing. 
Certain it is, we all admit that while Paul may plant, 
and Apollos water, it is God, and God alone, that gives 
the increase. We all pray for the conversion of sin- 
ners. We all feel — though none of us as deeply as 
we should — that if anything is done in the conversion 
of sinners, the utmost that man can say is: "Behold 
what God has done by me ! " With others this is 
called the immediate work of the Spirit ; with us, it is 
called the gracious providence of God. Call it what 
you will, there must be a door opened ; and it is God 
who opens the door. It is ours to pray for the open- 
ing, to watch for the opening ; and when it comes, to 
enter in and work with God and for him. 

But our text places in juxtaposition with this 
thought of great opportunity providentially afforded, 
another thought, not in itself startling, but startling 
from the place it occupies and the relation it bears ; 
that is, great opposition. Great opportunity and great 
opposition. A great and effectual door is opened ; and 
there are many adversaries. Strangely as this sounds, 
the association is not unnatural. The same soil that 
produces a luxuriant yield of corn produces also a cor- 
responding abundance of weeds and noxious plants. 
The same sun and rain that make the grass to spring, 
start also the poisonous vine ; and the slimy serpent 
is warmed into life by the same suubeams that 
speed the flight of the lark and wake his morning song. 
If the press gives us Bibles, it also gives us infidel 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 83 

books as readily. If free speech enables us to preach 
the gospel without restraint, it equally removes re- 
straint from the enemy of the gospel. If the in- 
fluences of the age quicken intellect and promote 
education, this furnishes power as well to the foe as to 
the friend of Christ. If steam speeds the movements 
of the herald of truth, it equally speeds the movements 
of his adversary. And if the hearts of good men are 
stirred to attempt great things for God, it is to be ex- 
pected that the hearts of bad men will be stirred to 
attempt great things in opposition. Moreover, there is 
a law in the moral universe corresponding to that which 
prevails in the material system, by virtue of which 
harmony and equipoise are developed by the play of 
antagonistic forces. The centripetal and centrifugal 
forces belong to both systems ; and far beyond what 
we can comprehend in our greatest grasp of thought, 
the purposes of God in behalf of ultimate order, peace 
and blessedness are developed in the fierce antagonism 
of good and evil, truth and falsehood, life and death. 
We need not wonder, therefore, at the juxtaposition, 
in our text, of great opportunities with great opposi- 
tions. Inattention to the inevitable association of 
these is what gives rise to the entirely opposite esti- 
mates made of the age we live in. To some it is an 
age of great progress and of great glory. Slavery is 
dying, liberty is triumphant ; thrones of despotism are 
tottering ; church and state are dissolving their accursed 
partnership ; light is spreading ; the public conscience 
is becoming more sensitive ; science is winning marvel- 
ous triumphs ; war is losing its horrors ; sectarianism is 
being shorn of its prestige ; nations are coming into 
closer relations; barbarous empires are opening their 



84 OPPORTUNITY AND OPPOSITION, 

gates to Christian influences; and the millennium is 
surely coming! On the other hand we have a most 
lugubrious outlook, and most dolorous vaticinations. 
Wars are more terrible than ever ; crime is rampant ; 
vice is shameless ; pride and fashion are swallowing up 
all manly virtue and womanly goodness ; stock-gam- 
bling and drunkenness have utterly debauched the 
public conscience ; marriage has lost its sacredness, and 
the foundations of society are crumbling ; liberty is 
but a name ; imperial despotism and red republicanism 
are but different phases of the same utter godlessness 
that blots out all virtue ; the pope of Rome is sup- 
planted by the more hateful king of Italy ; and crime 
is increasing even in the lands where it was supposed 
it had reached its maximum ; the world is godless, the 
churches Christless ; and there is no hope left for truth 
and virtue but for Christ to come and put an end to 
the controversy by the terrors of omnipotence. 

These parties have each but half a picture. They 
are both right and both wrong, like the knights who 
fought over the shield which was gold on one side and 
silver on the other, but of which they each had seen 
but one side. Our text affords a solution of the diffi- 
culty : A great and effectual door is opened ; and 
there are many adversaries. 

This leads into the heart of our discourse: the 
encouragements and discouragements that belong to 
the work in which we are engaged. It is wise to look 
at both. 

Let us look at the great and effectual door that 
is opened to us in our missionary work in the State of 
Ohio. Going back half a century, to the beginning of 
this reformatory movement, let us look at the errors 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 85 

and wrongs which the reformers complained of as 
justifying their plea for reformation : 

1. Numerous, ever-increasing and hostile sects, filled 
with strife and bitterness, "hateful and hating one 
another." 

2. Human creeds, some of them of large dimensions, 
embodying much more philosophy than faith, and sub- 
stituting metaphysical speculations for the simplicity of 
the gospel of Christ ; and these erected into standards 
of orthodoxy and tests of fellowship, so that believers, 
who ought to have been one in Christ, were alienated 
and divided by rival systems of theology, and ruled by 
party watchwords such as the Bible knows nothing of — 
to the great scandal of the cause of Christ. 

3. Religious mysticism — the simple faith and obe- 
dience to which the gospel calls us being supplanted 
by mystical conceptions of spiritual influence, so that 
dreams, visions, strange sights and sounds, and unusual 
emotions were of more authority in the matter of re- 
generation and conversion than the plainest declara- 
tions of the word of God ; and a text of Scripture 
springing into the memory under strong excitement of 
mind was more the voice of God than the soberest de- 
ductions resulting from the most careful and enlightened 
exegesis of the Holy Scriptures. 

4. Hierarchical arrogance — the uplifting of clerical 
and priestly claims to expound the Scriptures and rule 
the Church of God ; so that merely human inventions 
and pretensions were making void the commandments 
of God, and defacing if not destroying the character of 
the Church of Christ as a spiritual brotherhood. Along 
with this were formalism and ritualism — the other ex- 
treme from that blind emotionalism mentioned in the 



86 OPPORTUNITY AND OPPOSITION, 

last item — reducing religion to a stereotyped set of doc- 
trines and round of ceremonies, almost wholly unknown 
to the primitive church. 

5. A superstitious reverence for King James's ver- 
sion of the Scriptures, so that its very errors and absurd- 
ities were regarded as inspired, and all attempts to re- 
move them by faithful and learned criticism as sacrilege. 

The results of all this were deplorable. Religion 
was to myriads a matter of awful uncertainty ; there was 
no telling whether one was a Christian or not. Men 
vibrated between exultant hope and blank despair, all 
life long robbed of settled peace in believing. Myriads 
more were driven into doubt as to the truth of religion 
itself. Party animosities not only divided and distracted 
the forces which ought to have been moving on in 
harmony for the conquest of the world, but presented 
so hateful an aspect of religious life to the world as to 
rob it of converting power. The clangor and clashing 
of theological warfare did not sound like that sweet 
singing of the angels when Christ was born — Glory to 
God, etc. Moreover, the rivalries of sects gave rise to 
every sort of effort on the part of each to gain or to 
maintain the ascendency ; so that the church was largely 
secularized, and the power of primitive unity, spiritu- 
ality and singleness of purpose almost utterly lost. 
This is a sad picture ; but it is very feebly and dimly 
drawn, and does injustice to the truth in its too limited 
and too feeble statements. 

In opposition to all this, the plea for reformation 
was sent forth, marked by the following distinctive 
features : 

I. The essential unity of the followers of Christ. 
Sects are unscriptural, mischievous and wicked, and 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. Sj 

the people of God should abandon them, and return to 
the original teaching of one Lord, one faith, etc. 

2. The alone-sufficiency and all-sufficiency of the 
Holy Scriptures as a rule of faith and practice. Au- 
thoritative human creeds should be abandoned, and 
nothing be required as a term of membership in the 
church, or as a bond of fellowship, for which there can 
not be produced a thus saith the Lotd, in express pre- 
cept or approved precedent. 

3. The gospel the power of God to salvation, in 
opposition to all professed revelations of the Spirit in 
dreams, visions, voices and impressions. The gospel 
consists of (1) facts — facts replete with the wisdom, grace 
and power of God ; facts to be believed, and which 
when believed will shatter skepticism, destroy pride, 
root out sinful desires, and bring the soul in repentance 
to bow humbly to the will of God ; (2) of command- 
ments — of commandments to be obeyed ; command- 
ments in cheerfully accepting which we may test our 
change of heart, and learn how far we are genuinely 
converted; (3) of promises — promises of pardon, 
of adoption of the Holy Spirit, of fatherly guidance 
and priestly intercession, of spiritual fellowship, and of 
the joys of an endless life ; promises to be appropri- 
ated and enjoyed as the result of hearty obedience to 
the gospel. So that when we believe the facts, obey 
the commandments, and enjoy the promises of the 
gospel, we are Christians, and may know it and re- 
joice in it as surely as we may know the existence of 
God and of Christ. And all this is in the gospel, 
always, everywhere, day and night, year in and year 
out, for every one who will accept it, and for all on 
precisely the same conditions. 



SS OPPORTUNITY AND OPPOSITION, 

4. The equal brotherhood of all Christians — all 
children of God, all kings and priests to God. No 
popes ; no cardinals ; no archbishops ; no clergy ; no 
hierarchy ; ' ' for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. n Father- 
ly teachers and guides ; brotherly helpers, and genuine 
brotherly cooperation in all good works — these may be 
and must be ; but no lords over the heritage of God — 
none to have dominion over our faith. 

5. Theflure word of God as our light and our food ; 
and fellowship in keeping the commandments ot our 
Lord Jesus Christ. Every one bound to honor Jesus 
and obey him ; no one bound in aught outside of this. 
Every soul answerable to God for its convictions and 
doings in all else ; answerable to its brethren only for 
integrity in the faith of Christ and faithful obedience 
to his laws. Hence it became a matter of the first 
importance to possess the pure word of God, and to 
cast out all interpolations and corruptions of the text. 
The careful and critical study of the original text and 
a faithful translation of that text, that all men might 
know the truth and walk in its light, became an essen- 
tial demand from the principles already adopted. 

In a word, the Church of the New Testament, in 
opposition to sects ; Christ in opposition to all human 
leaderships ; faith in Christ and obedience to Christ, as 
terms of fellowship, in opposition to all doctrinal and 
ecclesiastical tests ; the New Testament, in opposition 
to all human creeds, as the standard of truth in the 
church ; and gospel facts, conditions and promises, in 
opposition to all imaginative, arbitrary or mystical 
evidences of pardon and adoption : — these are the 
prominent items of the reformation we have been 
pleading, which in fifty years has gathered half a mil- 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 89 

lion of communicants in this land, and thirty thou- 
sand in this state. 

The conflict has been a severe one — not always 
wisely waged, it may be ; not without some mixture 
of error and extravagance ; but, in the main, it has 
been manfully and ably waged, and bravely sustained 
against tremendous opposition. But to-day we are 
enabled to say, with Paul, in reference to this plea, 
"A great and effectual door is opened unto us." 
These fifty years have witnessed a gradual but won- 
derful revolution in the religious sentiments of the 
people. The hyper-Calvinism and Antinomianism 
then so prevalent, and so fruitful a source of protest 
and revolt, is scarcely heard of. Many of the fierce 
controversies of that time have entirely ceased. The 
theological speculations of that period have given 
place to matters of more solid, practical import. The 
theologians and mystics of that time regarded us as 
little better than infidels, because we fixed the sinner's 
attention only on Christ, and received him into bap- 
tism on his simple avowal of faith in Jesus as the 
Christ, the Son of God; but Rationalism has forced 
this issue upon the Christian world, so that to-day the 
great question in theology is the Christological ques- 
tion, and everything distinctive between the believing 
and unbelieving world hinges on the answer to this 
question: Is Jesus the Christ, the Son of God, or 
not? 

Creed authority is on the wane : has, in fact, 
largely departed. Even in good old Scotland, where 
metaphysics and stubbornness find their best embodi- 
ments, creeds have lost their sacredness, and their wise 
men confess that a new departure must be made. In 



go OPPORTUNITY AND OPPOSITION, 

this country, no one dreams longer of holding the 
membership of the churches to the church standards ; 
and they are fast learning that they can not hold the 
clergy either. More and more men are learning every- 
where to value faith in Christ and obedience to Christ 
as the true test of Christian fellowship, and to reduce 
all else to the plea of expediency. Sect-dominion is 
also rapidly waning. The demand for the union of 
Christians is increasing every day, and the charms of 
denominationalism are not half so prominent in the 
public eye as its evils and mischiefs. The science of 
Biblical criticism may be said to have been recon- 
structed during these fifty years, so that the necessity 
for a more faithful translation of the Scriptures is no 
longer debatable. 

Add to this the general revolution in the public 
mind as to investigating all these questions. There is 
no longer trouble to obtain a hearing. No apology is 
needed these days for overhauling these questions and 
pointing out the need of reformation. It is rather 
demanded. A man needs but to be manly, honorable, 
respectful and competent, and everywhere his plea will 
be listened to with interest. 

In all this, it will be seen that a great and effectual 
door is opened to us. I need allude to but one ad- 
ditional fact of this nature. The last year has brought 
us into a more friendly and favorable relation with our 
Baptist brethren, in so far, at least, as to prepare the 
way to exchange the hostilities of the past for friendly 
and candid inquiry. What may come of this, no one 
can foresee; but it must be good, and not evil. Essen- 
tially we are one people. There are not more ser- 
ious differences between us than they find among 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 9 1 

themselves — than we find among ourselves. In all 
that is cardinal in Christian faith and practice — stand- 
ing on the authority of the same New Testament, 
pleading for the same Lord, the same faith and the 
same baptism — we are, I repeat, essentially one peo- 
ple, and ought to be able, ere long, to enter into 
friendly intercourse and hearty cooperation. Our 
differences belong largely to the past. Those which 
remain are not sufficiently serious to warrant a hostile 
array of forces. We have no desire to attempt to 
force a union ; nor have we, indeed, any great anxiety 
as to the issue of the attempt we have made to over- 
come the alienations of the past. We have only fol- 
lowed the leadings of Providence, and we have confi- 
dence that if union is the best thing, a great and effec- 
tual door will be opened. 

But now we must look at the other side: "And 
there are many adversaries." 

It is idle to attempt to disguise the fact that, while 
the opportunity for spreading the truth is great, the 
opposition is correspondingly great. 

I. Look at Roman Catholicism, with its shameless 
avowal of the despotic spirit and doctrines of the 
darkest of the dark ages, and its impious claim to 
papal infallibility ; its open hostility to freedom of 
conscience, freedom of speech, free schools and state 
education. And look at her progress, in spite of all 
this, in our own land ; her immense purchases of real 
estate, her control of politics and of the public funds, 
and the fear and dread of offending her that is mani- 
fested by our politicians generally ; and you have one 
style of opposition formidable in its dimensions and in 
the practiced skill by which it is conducted. 



92 OPPORTUNITY AND OPPOSITION, 

2. Look at Rationalism, in its varied phases, undei- 
fying Christ, and pantheistically deifying human rea- 
son ; plying the inquisitive minds of the age with the 
follies and discords of the Protestant world, and para- 
lyzing the faith of myriads in the word of God and the 
divinity of our Lord Jesus. Not so much in the con- 
verts openly made as in the indifferentism everywhere 
engendered, is its power to be dreaded. It is a dread- 
ful reaction from the creed bondage of the past. In 
rejecting human authority, they reject also the divine, 
and the inspired creed is swept with the uninspired in- 
to a common condemnation. 

3. Far more widespread is the mischief arising 
from the intensely secular spirit of the age. The last 
mentioned evil is one that is realized by thinkers and 
students ; but the mass of people do not think nor 
study closely on these subjects. Without much 
thought or study they drink in the spirit of the age, 
which is grossly material and worldly. It is an age of 
material interests. Even science is subsidized by ma- 
terialism, and has its chief value in ministering to the 
advancement of these material interests. Education 
no longer proposes intellectual and moral enlargement 
and elevation as an end. Its end now is to fit us for 
the successful pursuit of wealth. Money is more than 
intellect, and intellect more than heart, these days. 
We are willing to wear the long ears of Midas, if 
only everything we touch may turn to gold. This 
insane thirst for riches, and the absorbing interest in 
the worldly pursuits which it necessarily engenders, 
puts every spiritual interest in peril. Not only are the 
devotees of wealth impervious to all attacks made by 
the Gospel on heart and conscience, but the church is 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 93 

unnerved for the attack that ought to be made. This 
secular spirit is eating out the piety of heart and home 
and church. The closet is forsaken ; the family altar 
crumbles. The Bible is no longer the book of the 
household. The daily papers, saturated with worldli- 
ness, and reeking with vice and crime, and the weekly 
or monthly journal of literature and fashion, utterly 
Christless, if not positively infidel ift its tendencies, 
form the reading of the family. Beyond this, if books 
are reached, they are apt to be frothy fictions, written 
to minister to sensationalism, and leaving the reader 
with hot blood and prurient desires. Our children go 
from these almost Godless homes to secular schools, 
from which anything moral and religious is being most 
diligently rooted out in obedience to the atheistic de- 
mands of a foreign population, who are not content to 
enjoy in this land the liberty which Christianity has 
given them, but seek to establish in our country the 
same atheistic principles that have already sapped the 
foundations of morals in Europe and made France the 
helpless, pitiable spectacle she is to-day. And our 
churches are invaded by the same secular spirit. The 
simplicity and spirituality of the Church of God are 
sacrificed to pride and fashion. The crashing thunders 
of truth against all sin and wrong are exchanged for 
dulcet notes of rhetorical elegance, or for the sky- 
rockets of a sensational oratory. A false and hollow 
liberalism succeeds to the stern old bigotry that used 
to reign in the pulpit. Very short prayers and ten- 
minute sermons are the rage now. For the rest, the 
house of God must be made a place of refined amuse- 
ment, so as to draw. Either delicious music or start- 
ling oratory must be had, to draw. And when our 



94 OPPORTUNITY AND OPPOSITION, 

children go from such homes into such schools, and 
from such schools into such churches, what sort of a 
generation are we training for the work of God ? I 
tremble when I think of it. 

It is this worldliness, so widespread and so insinu-> 
ating, that more than anything else paralyzes our mis- 
sionary efforts. We are so intoxicated with the spirit 
of the times that we can not be brought to sympathize 
with a world that is rushing down to death. And we 
grow so selfish and ambitious in the midst of our earthly 
prosperities that we have no heart to give as we ought 
to give in the missionary work. There is ever an in- 
creasing selfishness attending our growth in wealth, 
which very few escape. We have less sympathy with 
the world, and more anxiety for our own interests. 
And this operates in regard to our religious givings as 
in all other things, We lose our sympathy with the 
world of mankind. We learn to sneer at foreign mis- 
sions, and figure on it to ascertain how much it costs 
to convert a soul in Africa or India. Nor does it stop 
there. We soon lose all interest in benevolent enter- 
prises in our own land, outside of our own neighbor- 
hood. Nothing can open our purse, unless it is some- 
thing in our own neighborhood, for our church, and for 
the benefit of our community. Nor will it stop there. 
For this mean selfishness is ordained to curse its pos- 
sessor until it withers and blights every generous and 
noble impulse of his nature, and will eat him up at last 
with carking care and nervous fear lest he himself 
should desire some benefit from his possessions and 
make some needless drain on his own resources. 
"There is that scattereth and yet increaseth ; and there 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 95 

is that withholdeth more than is meet, and it tendeth 
to poverty." 

When I look to-day on the gates that God has 
opened rn Italy, and Spain, and Austria, and Mexico, 
that his people may enter in, and think of the demands 
for Bibles and colporteurs and preachers, to give the 
bread and water of life to famishing multitudes, and 
remember that we have not one man offering for the 
work, nor one dollar to give to such an one, were he to 
offer, I bow myself in the dust for very shame. When 
I look at our own broad land, and listen to the cry 
coming up from all quarters, from men of every country 
who have come hither for refuge and rest ; and look at 
the millions of degraded freedmen ready to sink back 
into the lowest superstitions, and think how little we 
are doing for them, I begin to ask whether we believe 
what we preach. But when I look into our own state, 
and see the demands at our very doors, and the open- 
ings that God has made for us, and see how slow we 
are to enter, and how little there is of spontaneity in 
our 'benevolence, I am staggered at the spectacle, and 
know not what to say. 

If we had no higher motives than ordinary patriot- 
ism, it should inspire us to greater efforts than we are 
making. I have alluded to the secular character of our 
public school education, and to the fact that it is be- 
coming less and less moral and religious. It is to my 
mind clearly evident that such an education can never 
subserve the interests of the state, and that the church 
must do for the state what the state can not do for 
itself — infuse into society the moral and spiritual poten- 
cies which alone can conserve the interests of freedom, 
and impart the soul-culture without which a merely in- 



96 OPPORTUNITY AND OPPOSITION, 

tellectual education may be more of a curse than a 
blessing. In Binghamton, N. Y., on Friday last, a 
criminal received his doom as a murderer, whose intel- 
lectural attainments have caused our best scholars to 
marvel. As a linguist he was a prodigy. His profound 
and varied acquirements were such that an appeal was 
made for his life in the interests of literature and 
science. Yet he was the murderer of wife and child, 
as well as of others: — a thief, and an ingrate of the 
blackest dye. His sublime recklessness threw a spell 
about his history until the last moment, and obscenities 
and blasphemies filled the hours until the last, and 
without a tear, or a prayer, or a penitential sigh, he 
sported on the very brink, and carried his audacity and 
recklessness with him into the world beyond. Such 
brilliant intellect with such moral recklessness looks 
like a personification of Satan himself — and pity 'tis 
that we should seek to conform to such a model in our 
educational systems. We can not keep this country 
for God and for freedom, unless moral and spiritual cul- 
ture shall keep pace with intellectural culture and ma- 
terial enterprise. Righteousness exalteth a nation. 
The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom. And 
this culture the church alone can give. From the very 
nature of our free institutions, the government can do 
but little in this line. He is the truest patriot, then, 
who most effectually promotes moral and religious in- 
terests in the community, and wins most hearts to vir- 
tue and righteousness. 

But this is putting our plea on low, utilitarian 
ground, and is itself, perhaps, an appeal to selfishness. 
We must look higher. I said, in the outset, that the 
Gospel is only the power of God when it comes in 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 9/ 

contact with the heart and conscience ; and that we 
must rely on Providence to open the door of access to 
individuals and to communities. But that is not the 
whole truth. There is not only room here for divine 
agency, but for human agency as well. If God opens 
the door, we must enter in and bear the Gospel with 
us. Between the printed page of the glorious Gospel 
of the grace of God and the human heart in which it 
is to plant the power of God there is room for a great 
variety of ministries. The parent, the Sunday-school 
teacher, the preacher, the colporteur, the editor, the 
tract distributer, the Bible reader, all have work here. 
And here is our sphere of operations as a Missionary 
Society. When we look on the deep and dark idola- 
tries of men, the mad devotion of the human heart to 
sinful pleasure and selfish gratification, the terrible en- 
slavement of men to every form of sin until they hug 
their chains and bless their bondage, we can not but 
feel our impotence in attempting the regeneration of 
society. No human power can effect it. But the 
power of God is made available for this end. It comes 
to us in the Gospel. It is a living and powerful word. 
It penetrates, it smites, it breaks in pieces ; it wounds 
and heals, it kills and makes alive ; it reaches to the 
very foundation of life with the energy of omnipotence ; 
its thunders boom over the conscience with crashing 
terror, and its tempest-force sweeps like a hurricane 
over the soul, and pride and stubbornness and the idols 
of the heart are swept in crushed fragments like a leaf 
in the storm. It sheds light and peace when the 
storm is over, and in its light a new creation rises, over 
whose regenerate beauties and glories the morning stars 
sing a sweeter anthem, and all the Sons of God shout 



98 OPPORTUNITY AND OPPOSITION, 

for joy. But this power must be applied. That is our 
part. God grants the power. God opens the way for 
it. But we must apply it. We can not create good 
men ourselves. But we can let in the creative power 
of God upon the souls of men, that they may be 
created anew in Christ Jesus. We are honored with 
this august position as co-workers with God ; shall we 
be so base as to sell this birthright for a mess of pot- 
tage — so ignoble as to refuse, through indolence or in- 
difference, to sway this Godlike power for the salvation 
of the world ? 

But I said, we must pray — pray to Him who alone 
opens the door, who alone gives the increase. And I 
greatly fear that our lack of work grows largely out of 
our lack of prayer. Think you, we have ever yet 
learned to pray? I know some who think the Lord's 
prayer is a thing of the past ; but I doubt if we have 
ever yet learned to pray that prayer aright. I doubt 
if we have yet learned the true spirit of its first peti- 
tions. Let us see. What is the first petition in that 
prayer ? Grant me life ? No. Grant me health ? No. 
Grant me wealth ? No. Bless me and mine with all 
good things, and keep us from all harm and suffering, 
and let not adversity come nigh us, and let us have our 
own sweet will to do as we please ? Oh ! no, no, no. 
The first petition is, " Thy Kingdom come " And the 
second is like unto it, namely, "Thy will be done in 
earth as it is done in heaven." And how much does 
he teach us to pray for of worldly goods ? Just one 
day s supply of food — that is all. "Give us this day 
our daily bread." Christ would thus teach us to sub- 
ordinate the earthly to the heavenly, the material to 
the spiritual. We have never learned that prayer, 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 99 

then, unless we have learned to make the spiritual first 
in our affections, and the interests of the kingdom of 
God the first and dearest desire and aim of our lives ; 
and unless we have subjugated our will to the will of 
God, until we can say, "Thy will; not mine — Thy 
will be done," etc. 

Oh ! it is this, it is this, dear brethren, that we need 
to make us what we ought to be. We are too much 
devoted to our theories of the world's conversion, and 
too little given to the work of converting the world. 
We are too little humbled before God in view of our 
weakness and inefficiency, our selfishness and sinful- 
ness. We know far too little of that absorbing, en- 
thusiastic desire for the spread of the Kingdom of God 
which would lead us to pray always first, " Thy King- 
dom come, Thy will be done." It was the first and the 
last struggle of the tempter with Jesus to persuade 
him to supplant the will of God with some other will — 
any other, no matter what ; it was the first and last 
victory of Jesus over the tempter, though it cost 
bloody sweat, and bitter cryings and tears, to cling to 
the will of God and say in the darkest hour, Thy will 
be done. Would that we might all be brought, through 
whatever humiliation and agony, to this point of entire 
submission : how mightily would God enable us to 
move forward the triumphs of his Kingdom ! We 
have the men, we have the money, we have the open 
door; we want supreme devotion to the will of God, a 
devotion that shall conquer our love of the world and 
our carnal security. 



IOO OPPORTUNITY AND OPPOSITION. 

Let us learn to say, with one of the sweetest of 
our American poets: 

We see not, know not ; all our way 
Is night; with Thee alone is dajr. 
From out the torrent's troubled drift, 
Above the storm our prayer we lift — 
Thy will be done ! 

The flesh may fail, the heart may faint ; 
But who are we to make complaint, 
Or dare to plead, in times like these, 
The weakness of our love of ease ? 
Thy will be done! 

We take with solemn thankfulness 
Our burden up, nor ask it less ; 
And count it joy that even we 
May suffer, serve, or wait for Thee, 
Whose will be done ! 

Though dim as yet, in tint and line 
We trace Thy picture's wise design, 
And thank Thee that our age supplies 
The dark relief of sacrifice. 
Thy will be done ! 

And if, in our unworthiness, 
Thy sacrificial wine we press, 
If from Thy ordeal's heated bars 
Our feet are seamed with crimson scars — 
Thy will be done ! 

Strike! Thou the Master, we Thy keys, 
The anthem of the destinies ! 
The minor of Thy loftier strain, 
Our hearts shall breathe the old refrain — 
Thy will be done ! 



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

An Address Delivered at the Printers' Festival, in 
Warren, January 17, 1853. 

Terence, the Roman dramatic poet, in one of his 
comedies, gave utterance to a sentiment which, when 
repeated on the stage, is said to have wrought up the 
vast crowd of auditors to such a pitch of admiration 
that they burst forth in the most rapturous applause. 
"Homo sum, humani nil alienum puto ," * said the poet. 
It is a noble sentiment, not only as expressing the 
sympathy and benevolence due from man to man, 
springing out of our common brotherhood ; but as set- 
ting forth the value and interest attaching to humanity 
itself. Our nature is furnished with a machinery so 
wonderful in its combinations, it is a workmanship so 
exquisite, a creation with such strange and varied en- 
dowments, that all its developments, whether in the 
master or the slave, the civilized or the savage, the 
virtuous or the vicious, the patriarch, the youth or the 
infant, ought to possess abiding interest. In the lan- 
guage of one of our English poets, 

"The proper study of mankind is man.** 
We may be allowed, therefore, to connect some im- 
portance with the object of our festival this evening — 
having in view to do honor to the name of one worthy 
to be called a man ; who stands among the tall chief- 
tains of our race, stately in the proportions and majes- 

* "I am a man ; nothing: human is uninteresting to me." 



102 BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

tic in the mien of his nature, and loaded with honors 
which all the world accord were well deserved. Great 
men — the good and great — are God's best gifts to the 
world. They are rare. It is only here and there, in 
the vast fields of human activity and enterprise, you 
can discover one sufficiently prominent to attract all 
eyes, and challenge universal admiration. And with 
many, even of these, 

" 'Tis distance lends enchantment to the view ;" 

a nearer inspection discovering the cheat, and making 
us sick of greatness. A truly great man leaves the 
impress of his spirit on his country — his age — the 
world. Whether he makes the age, or the age makes 
him, in either case he is the embodiment of great prin- 
ciples and energies, which through him are awakened 
and expressed so as to give features to the great move- 
ments by which his times are distinguished ; and no 
one finds it difficult to trace the image and superscrip- 
tion of the age's man stamped on them. Some great 
men owe their greatness to the age. They were lucky 
in the period of their birth. They appeared to public 
view just in time to avail themselves of that tide which, 
"taken at the flood, leads on to fortune," and they 
had the wisdom to know the age, its wants and capac. 
ities and tendencies, and how to avail themselves, with 
true generalship, of its forces, to accomplish their mis- 
sion. Such were Caesar, Napoleon, Washington ; 
such, to take a fresh instance from the world of letters, 
is Mrs. Stowe. Others, as Kossuth and Mazzini, lack- 
ing the favorable circumstances, have failed through 
the unhappy necessities of the times. Again, there is 
a host of deformed great ones — great in some one at- 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 103 

tribute, some special endowment. Their phrenologi- 
cal busts develop mountain ridges, breaking up here 
and there in abrupt fissures and ravines, and sloping 
off on either side into barrenness and empty nothing- 
ness. The immense protuberances of mind and genius, 
like volcanic peaks, blazing with singular splendor 
amidst fearful desolation. We are pained to mention 
such names as Swift, Sheridan, and Byron, as speci- 
mens of this deformity of genius and of greatness. 
Then there are accidental great ones, great by the acci- 
dent of birth, or wealth, or revolution. How many a 
dunce and fool has been called His Majesty, and been 
worshiped by a world of superiors ! And how many 
a knave has been lifted up on a wave of revolution to 
greatness, while many a nobler craft has perished from 
view in the trough of the sea ! And others have been 
great in spite of the age — have risen above it, reached 
beyond it, mastered it, and made it their own. Aris- 
totle, Columbus, and Luther, are fair types of this 
smallest class of great men. 

It is in view of all these considerations bearing on 
the question of true greatness that we place the name 
of Benjamin Franklin, as 

V One of the few, the immortal names, 
That were not born to die." 

We do not find many instances in the world's history 
where so little of the accidental belongs to a great 
man's life. Franklin's life is rather a perpetual series 
of triumphs over great odds ; and so far from proving 
that man is the ''creature of circumstances, " would go 
far to establish the proposition that circumstances are 
the creatures of man. It is in struggling with adver- 



104 BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, 

sity that true greatness shines most illustriously. 
Cicero, whimpering like a child in his banishment, and 
talking of suicide because his prosperity and fame 
suffer an eclipse, is an object of contempt. But 

" More real joy Marcellus, exiled, feels. 
Than Caesar, with a senate at his heels." 

Leonidas and his Spartan band ; Xenophon, in his 
famous retreat of the ten thousand ; Kossuth in his 
exile, with his spirit of unquenchable and unconquer- 
able ardor ; Aristotle, Demosthenes, Columbus, Jean 
Paul, Milton^ Prescott, fighting their way over almost 
impossibilities to complete success : it is to these that 
humanity looks for the assertion and vindication of its 
true nobility. 

Franklin did ample honor to his nature in this 
particular. Poor, uneducated, with none to sympa- 
thize with him in his views and ambitions, he worked 
his way from the post of drudge in a chandler's shop, 
and factotum in a printing office, to the front ranks of 
patriots, statesmen, philosphers and philanthropists, 
where not only the devotion and reverence of his coun- 
trymen were awarded to him, but also the cheerful 
homage of the literary and scientific savans of Europe, 
the enthusiastic admiration of all lovers of freedom, 
the approbation of kings and nobles, and the tribute, 
however reluctant, of his enemies' praise ; and a fame 
was won which will be enduring as the years of time. 
In Boston, New York, Philahelphia, or London, he 
pushes his way on through the difficulties of poverty 
in a world where he seeks and claims no regard nor 
favor but such as his own merits shall win for him. 
With a nature by no means stoical, he nevertheless 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 10$ 

steers clear of the whirlpools of vice and folly, and, 
for so young a craft, comes forth from the assaults of 
tempestuous passions with remarkable success, not 
only free from wreck, but scarcely harmed at all. Gain- 
ing reputation by his steady, persevering and success- 
ful contest with poverty and adversity, it was his lot to 
be called generally to difficult posts of duty. And if 
he owes part of his greatness to the times in which he 
flourished, to the successful issue of a revolution in 
which he acted an essential part, it is yet clear that 
the independence and originality and energy of his 
character would have enabled him, under any circum- 
stances, to carve his way to greatness. It is equally 
clear that the age owed as much to him as he owed to 
the age. 

But he was distinguished quite as much by his m- 
dustry as by his courage and independence. He was a 
hard worker — as all great men have been. We read 
sometimes of the eccentricities of genuis, until we 
almost conclude a man can not be great unless he be 
lazy, lethargic, slovenly, disorderly, and only spasmod- 
ically active. But while it is true that many with great 
wealth of genius have been spoiled and pampered until 
their treasures of mind, like inherited riches, costing 
no labor, prove more of a curse than a blessing, the 
really great men have all been men of toil. Caesar, 
Napoleon, Newton, Luther, Wesley, were men of in- 
cessant labor. And such was Franklin. Early and 
late he worked. He was a very careful economist of 
time. As he grew older, so far from relaxing his ef- 
forts, he multiplied them, and performed herculean 
tasks of labor in his private as well as his public life ; 
still finding time, amidst the crowded and oppressive 



106 BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, 

duties of every day life, for literary and scientific recre- 
ations, which in themselves would amount to more 
than the aggregate labors of the lives of most men. 

In the oiigination of enterprises he was great. He 
had a great deal of inventive genius. He owes much 
of his greatness to this. When all others are at a 
standstill, his mind, far-reaching and almost intuitively 
correct in its reasonings, would devise a plan of opera- 
tions. He could build fortifications, equip armies, es- 
tablish libraries, found universities, draw lightning 
from the clouds, and almost anything else within the 
compass of human means he could perform. He 
made a bold strike towards the phonographic reform, 
now asserting its claims and winning extensive 
triumphs. No magician could work wonders to com- 
pare with the amazing results wrought by this calm 
reasoner and philosopher. One scheme of his espe- 
cially shows the boldness of his inventive genius — I 
mean his plan of harmonizing the discords of the moral 
and religious world in a kind of electicism in which 
all might agree. It is well for his fame that he suffered 
it not to be identified with the success of such a sys- 
tem. Yet the system itself reveals a spirit prepared to 
struggle with the boldest evils and the hugest obsta- 
cles. But he had no spiritual kite for this experiment ; 
no moral conductor with which to rob of their wrath 
the storm-clouds that darkened the religious heavens. 

His life develops a marvelous versatility of talent. 
His greatness can not be said to depend on any one 
faculty, or talent, or manifestation of genius — no one 
act or class of actions. He is familiar with physics 
and metaphysics. He is a patriot, a philosopher, a 
statesman, a philanthropist — almost a theologian. He 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. \OJ 

builds fortifications and meeting houses ; writes squibs 
for newspapers, and philosophical essays for royal so- 
cieties of arts and sciences ; pens letters of friendship 
to shed light on the humble pathway of the sufferer, 
and arguments, satires, and philippics that make kings 
and parliaments tremble. He writes on music and on 
war ; on smoky chimneys, and the stamp act ; on taxes 
and electricity ; elephants, and small-pox, water-spouts, 
whirlwinds and tariff; balloons, and paper currency ; 
religion, and causes of colds ; swimming, and the refor- 
mation of the English language ; the way to choose 
spectacles, and the way to choose a wife ; planting 
hedges, linseed oil, and the harmony and melody of 
the old Scotch tunes ; earthquakes, and a plan of union 
for the colonies ; perspiration and absorption, and the 
slave trade ; militia, and the culture of silk ; canals, and 
spots on the sun ; stoves, shooting stars, and the con- 
dition of apprentices ; plans of education, rhubarb, 
and Chinese cheese ! He speculates on the best plan 
of gutters for the streets, and the best means of get- 
ting lightning from the clouds ; rebukes Britain's op- 
pression of her colonies, and suggests an improvement 
in the lamps that light the streets of her cities ; per- 
suades France into the cause of Liberty, and warns the 
Parisians against a waste of oil ; he tries cases as an 
esquire, presides over the legislature of Pennsylvania, 
and stands as a witness before Parliament ; he sets up 
type, upsets tyranny, and knocks the calculations of 
tories into pi ; edits papers, attends to the mails, and 
helps to make constitutions. He is printer, editor, 
magistrate, clerk, delegate, ambassador, colonel, A. M., 
LL. D., post-master, philosopher, poet, lawgiver; 
what is he not ? 



108 BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, 

His life is marked by large benevolence. It is some- 
times objected to Franklin that his maxims tend to 
make men miserly — that they enslave the soul to a 
penny. But this is neither the letter nor the spirit of 
his maxims ; nor is it the testimony of his life. Poor 
Richard's maxims originated in a benevolent regard for 
the poor, and were calculated to do more for their per- 
manent good than the largest munificence could accom- 
plish in scattering alms among them. He seems ever 
intent on measures that will lessen the evils and pro- 
mote the happiness of society. His whole life is a life 
of labor more for others than for himself. He gives his 
inventions without patent to the world, makes public 
property of all his vast wealth of mind, and never seeks 
to evade duty or responsibility, however painful, where 
the advantage of his friends, the honor of his country, 
or the interest of humanity are concerned. Counsel, 
money, time and talent — all were at the service of 
his country and his race. It is scarcely possible to 
over-estimate the value of his services to the cause of 
freedom before and during the Revolution. And the 
influence of that one life on the habits, manners and 
maxims of society ; on his country's emancipation, the 
new organization of her government, and on the pro- 
gress of physical science, it is impossible ever to calcu- 
late. It is certainly honorable to his memory that the 
last public act of his life was to sign, officially as presi- 
dent of an abolition society, a memorial to Congress 
in behalf of the enslaved African, beseeching them to 
"promote mercy and justice towards this distressed 
race, and to step to the very verge of the power vested 
in them for discouraging every species of traffic in the 
persons of their fellow-men." 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 109 

We look upon the goodness of Franklin as the su- 
perior part of his greatness. When we think of Demos- 
thenes, venal and a suicide ; of Cicero, cowardly, vain, 
and selfish ; of Caesar, a monster of crime ; of Socrates 
and Plato, both of doubtful morality ; of Byron and 
Burns, with the " infirmities of genius " loading them 
down ; and of Bacon — 

"The wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind" — 

we can not but reverence the pure and noble characters 
who have joined to their intellectual strength the richer 
attractions of the heart — gentleness, truthfulness, tem- 
perance, purity, kindness and benevolence. 

Were we asked now to point out what we consider 
defective in Dr. Franklin's character, we would say, 
with all possible admiration of his virtues and reverence 
for his honorable and world-renowned name, it is the 
absence of a lofty and earnest faith in Christianity, such 
as his clear and powerful mind might be supposed 
capable of reaching. Not that he was destitute of re- 
ligious principle and feelings. He had both. His 
reverence for the morality of Jesus was almost un- 
bounded. His faith in God's special providence was so 
strong as to put to shame that of many professed Chris- 
tians. His motion in the convention that formed the 
constitution, for daily public prayers, and his speech 
thereon, show in his old age, the eradication of the 
skeptical and irreligious tendencies of his youth. There 
is no reason either to doubt his full conviction of the 
immortality of the soul and a future state of retribution 
— although the epitaph, which is generally appealed to 
as proof, furnishes by no means as strong evidence of 
it as it would, could we regard it as the conception of 



1 16 benjamin franklin, 

his own mind, and the outflowing of his own religious 
convictions. It has less originality than anything bear- 
ing the name of Franklin. A poem written on the 
death of John Foster, a gentleman connected with the 
press, in 1681, by Joseph Capan, closed with the fol- 
lowing lines : 

" Thy body, which no activeness did lack, 

Now 's set aside, like an old Almanack ; 

But for the present only 's out of date ; 
' T will have at length a far more active state. 

Yea, though with dust thy body soiled be, 

Yet at the resurrection we shall see 

A fair edition, and of matchless worth, 

Free from err at as new in Heaven set forth ; 

'T is but a word from God the Great Creator ; 

It shall be done when he saith Imprimatur." 

This is so much in the same vein, that we can not 
help regarding the epitaph more as an improvement on 
this than as an original conception of his own mind, or 
as a record of his own heart's faith. Still we doubt not 
that he possessed faith in the doctrine of a future state ; 
that he saw the importance of the Christian faith on 
the moral improvement of society; that he sought to 
encourage it, reasoning in his own forcible and practi- 
cal way: "If men are so wicked with religion, what 
would they be without it ! " 

But a faith that would identify him with Christianity 
as a joyful recipient of its spiritual blessings, we know 
not of any evidence that he possessed. This was 
probably owing to the want of harmony between his 
intensely practical habit of mind and the intensely 
doctrinal cast of religion in the colonies at that time. 
Brought up amidst the sternness and awfulness of rigid 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. Ill 

Puritanism, when the discussions of the pulpit were 
very largely doctrinal ; and residing afterwards among 
the Quakers, who, just out of the fires of persecution, 
were very tenacious for the essentials of Quakerism, 
Franklin was not prepared to admire the abstractions, 
metaphysical disquisitions, and theological dogmata 
which were so much insisted on. He did not, indeed, 
do justice in his estimate of the practical influence of 
these doctrinal elaborations. Without the discrimina- 
tion usually marking his decisions, he rejected the 
creed and the ritual, and attended only to ethics. One 
can not but smile at his plan for helping devotion when 
the chaplain complained to him that the soldiers would 
not attend the religious services ; he made the chaplain 
steward of the rum, authorizing him to deal out half a 
gill to each man, morning and evening, after prayers ! 
On another occasion, when the great Whitfield was 
charming vast crowds with his eloquence, and swaying 
them to and fro like the trees of the forest under the 
sweep of the tempest, when every eye was dim with 
tears, and every heart was stirred to its depths, and 
every nature was electrified, Franklin coolly walked 
back to ascertain at what distance down street his voice 
could be heard, and to calculate how many thousands 
could stand within a given area and catch distinctly the 
burning words and inspirations of the orator. 

We could have wished for a deeper religious inspi- 
ration ; a loftier religious faith, to have given a crown 
of beauty and glory to a character so noble — that the 
religious attributes of his nature might not have been 
hidden amongst the prominent and grand develop- 
ments of mind, and heart, and life, which make him so 
deservedly illustrious and immortal. 



112 BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, 

But the character of this celebration, as well as the 
life of the illustrious man whom we honor, reminds me 
that a great art, no less than a great man, is to be spoken 
of and rejoiced in. If great men are God's gifts, great 
arts are men's gifts by which they multiply means of 
happiness and advancement for the world. And among 
these arts it is difficult to award superiority to any over 
the art of printing — * 'black art" though it be, and 
strongly suspected of an infernal origin, as appears by 
the story of Dr. Faustus and the devil. John Quincy 
Adams said that "the employment of alphabetical 
characters to represent all the articulations of the hu- 
man voice is the greatest invention that ever was com- 
passed by the human genius." Plato says it was the 
discovery of a God or a man divinely inspired. Many 
learned men have looked on it as of a divine origin. We 
believe that Mr. Adams has justly placed it as the first 
of human inventions. We place printing in the second 
rank in point of importance. Its bearings on human 
progress are not to be calculated. It has increased ten 
thousand fold the intellectual wealth of the world, and 
made common property of it all. When we remember 
that before the discovery of this art not only were the 
masses involved in ignorance, but multitudes of priests 
and nobles and princes could not read nor write ; that 
books were so scarce and dear that even the more edu- 
cated classes could possess but few of them ; that one 
Bible had often to serve several monasteries ; that even 
bishops had to borrow Bibles and give bond for their 
safe return ; that the donation of a book to a religious 
house was regarded as so valuable as to merit eternal 
salvation ; that in 1 300 the library at the University of 
Oxford consisted of a few tracts ; that about the same 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. I I 3 

time there were only four classics in the Royal Library 
at Paris; that the first edition of the Bible printed by 
Faust sold at first for six hundred crowns each ; I say 
when these and kindred facts are remembered, and v/e 
compare them with the facts of the present time, when 
a penny paper will often contain an amount of knowl- 
edge touching literature, science and religion which the 
great men of those times would almost have died of 
joy to have possessed, we can not place too high an 
estimate on this art. The changes wrought by the 
crusaders, chivalry, and the revival of commerce, would 
have amounted to but little had it not been for the in- 
vention of printing. What Bartholin says of books, 
we may say of the art which gives us books — "Without 
it God is silent, Justice dormant, Physic at a stand, 
Philosophy lame, Letters dumb, and all things involved in 
Cimmerian darkness." Without it, Luther would have 
been at best but another Wicklifte. In the dark ages, 
"communities resembled some isolated galvanic ele- 
ments, within the contracting spheres of which the 
affections and aspirations of the soul were forever gam- 
boling in self-exhausting gyrations. Time gradually 
added other elements ; but slow was the progress which 
men could make in knowledge and power through the 
mere instrumentality of tradition and manuscript — both 
indifferent conductors — and the battery, though its 
multiplied parts endowed it with increasing force, soon 
wore itself into decay. Then the press at once became 
the communicating medium of the ethereal fluid, and 
by its infinitely superior adaptedness raised the civi- 
lized world to the proud eminence which it now occu- 
pies on the heaving galvanic pile of mind, which seeks 
to outstrip the farthermost bounds of the very heavens. 



114 BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, 

The single-handed seeker after truth, cramped and fet- 
tered by authorities, could make but feeble unproduc- 
tive, and withal hazardous exploring expeditions into 
the hidden chambers of Nature's laboratory; and con- 
sequently the efforts of genius either soared away into 
the clouds, or else diverged into the winding and 
obscure paths of a labyrinth, where arose on some 
circumscribed basis of experiments, the speculative 
structures of the theosoph, the astrologer, and the 
alchemist." 

The press has brought all the intellectual riches of 
the world, all the treasures of literature, science and art 
from their secret depositories, and scattered them 
among the multitude, and made them the property of 
mankind. It has been compared to the first day's cre- 
ation, when God said, " Let there be light." But it is 
rather like the fourth day's work, when light-bearers 
were created ; when to the starless and sunless heavens 
of former days succeeded a firmament spangled with 
ten thousand stars of various magnitudes, the glories of 
many a constellation and galaxy of genius, the brilliance 
of a bright morning star of reformation, and the blaze 
of the Sun of Truth which arose with healing in his 
wings. 

No Aristotle now sits down with one royal pupil, to 
waste his years on him. He may have nations to sit 
at his feet. No reformer goes from kingdom to king- 
dom to utter thoughts and appeals that die with the 
utterance. The press gives him a trumpet through 
which to pour a blast that all the earth shall hear and 
be awakened to spiritual resurrection. The tyrants and 
oppressors of mankind can no longer riot in security, 
and mock at a groaning world around them. The press 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. U5 

warns them, like the handwriting on the wall, and at its 
warning "the joints of their loins are loosed, and their 
knees smite together with fear." "Give them a cor- 
rupt House of Lords, " said Sheridan; "give them a 
venal House of Commons ; give them a tyrannical prince ; 
give them a truckling court ; and let me have but an 
unfettered press, and I will defy them to encroach a 
hair's breadth upon the liberties of England." 

A free press is the scourge of tyrants, the dread of 
oppressors. It is like the angel in apocalyptic visions, 
who illuminated the earth with his glory, while in 
thunder tones he proclaimed the downfall of Babylon, 
and the introduction of millennial peace and blessed- 
ness. The man of letters, the devotee of science, the 
champion of freedom, the reformer, the statesman, the 
jurist, the theologian — all multiply their power in- 
finitely, and secure for themselves almost ubiquity and 
omnipotence in the accomplishment of their mission. 
Franklin owed much of his power to the press. In 
every emergency he sought it, and by its aid prepared 
the way for success. Without it the foundations of 
the despotisms of the old world had not yet been 
sapped, nor had the anthem of freedom's triumph 
been sung in the new. We may well glory, then, in 
art to which mankind is so deeply indebted for the 
spread of civilization, the diffusion of knowledge, the 
blessings of liberty, and the treasures of science and 
religion. We may be proud of the only manual pro- 
fession which was not accounted a derogation to 
nobility ; which conferred such honor that many who 
were of noble families, and eminent ecclesiastics were 
glad to learn it. We need not be ashamed of an art to 
which is lent the glory of such a name as Franklin's, 



Il6 BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, 

and which has given the first lessons of learning and 
greatness to many who have succeeded in winning an 
honorable name among men. 

"When Tamerlane had finished building his pyra- 
mid of seventy thousand human skulls, and was seen 
standing at the gate of Damascus, glittering with steel, 
with his battle-ax on his shoulder, till the fierce hosts 
filed to new victories and carnage, the pale onlooker 
might have fancied that nature was in her throes — for 
havoc and despair had taken possession of the earth, 
and the sun of manhood seemed setting in seas of blood. 
Yet it might be that on that very gala-day of Tamer- 
lane, a little boy was playing nine-pins in the streets of 
Mentz, whose history was more important to them than 
Tamerlane's ! The Tartar Khan, with his shaggy 
demons of the wilderness, passed away like the whirl- 
wind, to be forgotten forever ; but that German artist 
has wrought a benefit which is yet immeasurably ex- 
panding itself, and will continue to expand through- 
out all countries and all times. What are the conquests 
and expeditions of the whole corporation of Captains, 
from Walter the Pennyless to Napoleon Bonaparte, 
compared with the movable types of Johannes Faust ? " 

But we should be proud, not only of our connec- 
tion with this noble art, but of its wonderful progress, 
especially in our own beloved land. In January, 1639, 
just two hundred and fourteen years ago, the first 
printing was done within the limits of the territory now 
occupied by the United States. The first production 
from that press was the Freeman s Oath. In 167 1, Sir 
Wm. Berkely, Governor of Virginia, said, "I thank 
God we have not free schools or printing ; and I hope 
we shall not have, these hundred years. For learning 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. WJ 

has brought disobedience and heresy and sects into the 
world; and printing has divulged them, and libels 
against the government. God keep us from both." As 
late as 1683, Lord Effingham, as Governor, was ordered 
expressly "to allow no person to use a printing press 
on any occasion whatever." 

On the 24th of April, 1704, appeared the first 
number of the first regular newspaper in North America. 
It was the News Letter, published at Boston. In 172 1, 
Franklin says that his brother was dissuaded from pub- 
lishing his paper by his friends ; one paper, in their 
judgment, being enough for America. "At this time," 
(1771) says Franklin, rather exultingly, "there are not 
less than twenty-five." In 18 10 there were upwards of 
three hundred and fifty newspaper establishments, and 
the number of papers issued annually was estimated at 
twenty-two million. While in 1850 the number of 
papers and magazines was twenty-eight hundred, and 
the number of copies printed annually four hundred 
and twenty-two million six hundred thousand. In 
1 8 16 the aggregate circulation of all the papers in 
New York City was ninety-five hundred. Now, three 
of the daily papers issue in the aggregate more than 
one hundred thousand. When we take into account 
the increased size of the present issues, and the 
amount of talent and capital employed, and the 
vastly increased and enlarged range of subjects to 
which newspapers are devoted, it presents an im- 
mensely rapid progress in the power of the press. 
When we think of the interests of commerce, politics, 
agriculture, manufactures, sciences, arts, education and 
religion, as identified to a great extent with the press, 
this increase of its power is a great fact And we know 



1 1 8 * BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, 

not what bounds to set to human progress, if a free 
press is allowed to assert its power, and pour over the 
world its illuminations. But we venture not into the 
future. We will only say, as Franklin said, when an 
embassador in England, he visited the press at which 
he had worked forty years before, and drank with the 
pressman then at his old post. "Success to Print- 
ing " was his toast; and " Success to Printing" say we 
still, standing this much farther along the pathway of 
time, and seeing a fulfillment of his wish larger and 
ampler than he could possibly have anticipated. Suc- 
cess to Printing! May the craft ever be distinguished 
for intelligence, enterprise and moral worth ; and from 
their midst may many rise to eminence — if not to 
Franklin's greatness, at least to honorable distinction, 
to be a blessing to the world, and an honor to human 
nature. May the beams of truth, radiating over the 
earth from a free press, dispel the gloom of mental 
night, chase from the world the superstitions and false- 
hoods and iniquities that can not live in day, unmask the 
tyrannies and gigantic wrongs of despots, wake humanity 
from the degradation of a long reign of ignorance, and 
bathe the whole world in light, until the victory of truth 
is universal and complete — until the "wilderness and 
the solitary place be made glad, and the desert shall 
rejoice and blossom as the rose." 

And may you, gentlemen, though addicted to the 
black art y and on this account condemned to the galleys ; 
though constantly dancing attendance on balls, and fre- 
quently found engaged with cards ; though practicing 
frequent impositions, almost without a parallel ; having 
intercourse with the devil, aqd perhaps once so un- 
fortunate as to have been taken for the devil yourselves ; 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. I I9 

may you, notwithstanding the unhappy case in which 
these facts seem to leave you, be able yet to make 
good impressions, and present many a clean page to the 
world's eye. Amidst the press of business and worldly 
cares, may you enjoy many tokens of prosperity and 
peace ; may the influences of life be so happily dis- 
tributed that every chapter in your history may pre- 
sent the cleanest proof that your character is set rip ac- 
cording to copy. May the colaphon of life's volume 
contain a good report of you ; and when the book is 
used up, its contents are torn out, and it is stript of its 
lettering and gilding, may Franklin's hope be cherished, 
that ' ' it will appear again in a new and more elegant 
edition, revised and corrected 'by the Author." 



A PLEA FOR HOME MISSIONS. 

In consenting to deliver this address, I have been 
moved by one consideration, and the only one that 
makes it proper that I, rather than another, should per- 
from the task. Identified as I am, and have been from 
the first, with the Foreign Christian Missionary Society, 
it is wise to guard against any apprehension that my in- 
terest in home missions is abated, or that attention to 
the interests of foreign missions tends, in any degree, 
to a depreciation of the great missionary work to be 
done in our own land. The missionary work is one. It 
seems to me impossible to cherish an interest in mis- 
sions in foreign lands, and at the same time be in- 
different to the claims of missions in our own land. At 
least, such an interest would not be healthy or rational. 
Selfishness might prompt exclusive attention to our 
own land, our own state, our own district, or our own 
neighborhood ; and I fear that often this is the real 
hindrance to an adequate mission work in the distant 
frontiers of our own country. But selfishness will not 
dictate missionary labor in foreign lands and withhold 
it from our own. The love of souls, the reverence for 
our Lord's authority, which leads us to go to "the 
frozen Laplander and the sunburnt Moor " with the 
message of salvation, surely will not forbid or dis- 
courage the desire and the effort to save those who are 
about our own doors. It is probably on this principle 
that foreign missions have always reacted healthily 
and vigorously on home missions. And it has been 
with me, in the little I have been able to do for foreign 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 121 

missions, a constant desire and a constant conviction 
that success abroad would inspire greater efforts at 
home ; that a faith and hope and love that reach to the 
ends of the earth can not but comprehend in their am- 
ple folds the interest of those who are within easier 
reach, to bless whom is a much lighter tax alike upon 
our faith and our benevolence. Simply as a spiritual 
gymnasium — as a training-place for feats of moral and 
spiritual strength and daring — were there no other re- 
sult to follow, I regard foreign missions as a necessity. 
My conviction is that the stronger we grow in the work 
of faith, and patience of hope, and labor of love in the 
difficult and heroic task of bearing the Gospel to re- 
mote and unpromising regions, the stronger shall we be 
in the faith, hope and love needful for mission work at 
home. I have, therefore, gladly consented to appear be- 
fore the General Convention in a plea for home missions. 
It is impossible to take even a hurried glance at the 
destitute parts of our own land — destitute, I mean, so 
far as our own plea for the restoration of primitive 
Christianity is concerned — without being impressed, 
nay, overwhelmed, with the magnitude of the work 
before us. Rapidly as we have grown, our strength is 
confined mainly to a few states, and these in the West 
and Southwest. In the Middle States we are feeble ; 
in the New England States we are hardly known ; in 
the South proper we are known much more in name 
than in power ; in the Northwest our forces are scat- 
tered; while beyond the Rocky Mountains, on the 
Pacific slope, neither in numbers nor in organization 
are we capable of meeting the demands upon us. All 
of these vast fields are more or less inviting, and all 
are urgent in their appeals for help. 



122 HOME MISSIONS, 

New England not only pleads that in the prevalent 
upheavals of religious thought, and the marked discon- 
tent with and revolt against the religious faith of former 
times, multitudes could be arrested in their tendencies 
to skepticism by a presentation of our plea for the 
restoration of the simple faith and unity and catholicity 
of apostolic times ; but that if we were once well 
established in that region there would be a steady 
stream of emigration from her churches to the western 
churches, and we v/ould soon be abundantly repaid for 
all our outlay in the influx of intelligent and enterpris- 
ing disciples to our western communities. It is a 
sound plea, and ought not to be disregarded. 

In the South are the freedmen — as needy a people 
as almost any to be found on the face of the earth — 
whose education in morals and religion is demanded by 
enlightened patriotism as well as by Christian philan- 
thropy ; a patient, toilsome task to which our love of 
country and our love of souls give us a double invita- 
tion. It is also becoming more apparent every year 
that the white population of the South, in its whole 
range from the most ignorant to the most cultivated, 
but especially in what may be regarded as the sub- 
stantial class, can be successfully reached, and that only 
systematic and prudent effort is needed to give us, in 
that region, a fair degree of success. 

Then there is the great West and Northwest, to 
which the star of empire is rapidly taking its way, and 
where the foundation of new communities, the upbuild- 
ing of new institutions, and the enlistment of the sym- 
pathies, the rapidly growing fortunes, and the almost 
boundless enterprise of the bravest, strongest, most 
earnest, and soon to be the most powerful populations 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 1 23 

in all the Republic, invite us to a work which may well 
task our benevolence and our zeal to the utmost. 
Pause and think of this. The western migration of the 
last year is soberly estimated at six hundred thousand. 
Within the last five years it is calculated that two mil" 
lion five hundred thousand people have crossed the 
Mississippi on their way to western homes. Of these, 
one million eight hundred and eighty thousand were 
from the Atlantic States, and the vast majority Ameri- 
cans. This emigration was going on when immigration 
from Europe was at low figures. In 1878, for instance, 
less than one hundred and fifty thousand immigrants 
came to our shores, while six hundred thousand emi- 
grants settled in the new regions of the West. Of these 
six hundred thousand, but eighty thousand were for- 
eigners, leaving five hundred and twenty thousand 
(more than half a million) of our own people. One 
hundred and forty thousand farms and lots are reported 
to have been taken, averaging one hundred acres to a 
family. It is estimated, this year, outside of Texas, 
ten millions of acres of public lands will be taken up. 
Then think of the immensity of the territory in the 
West, Northwest and Southwest, in which these grow- 
ing millions are settling. In Nebraska, for instance, 
one hundred thousand people settled last year. There 
is Dakota, containing more than one hundred and fifty 
thousand square miles — as large as all New England, 
New York and Pennsylvania, or equal to New York, 
Pennsylvania, Ohio and Indiana combined. Through 
Northern Dakota runs the Northern Pacific railroad, 
which is destined to be a success. After all the prog- 
nostications of evil, there is found in that region the 
very best wheat-growing country in the United States. 



124 HOME MISSIONS, 

It is now estimated that within three years there will be 
one continuous wheat field, four hundred miles long, 
and from fifty to eighty miles wide, containing more 
than fifteen million acres. There is already an enor- 
mous tide of people — Canadians, Scotch — flowing into 
Dakota ; also, there is a very large immigration into 
Southern Dakota as new railroad lines are being pushed 
westward and northward, and new avenues of com- 
merce are springing up on every hand. In Montana, 
too, the Northern Pacific will soon be extended one hun- 
dred miles into the valley of the Yellowstone, and the 
Northern Utah railroad one hundred miles further 
towards the capital of the state, opening the way for 
new myriads of the bold and enterprising spirits that 
stand ready for new adventures. Of the new Red River 
country, Bishop Peck, who recently visited it, says : 

"The Catholics, keen-eyed as usual, are there with 
men a~d money, and are as rapidly as possible pre- 
empting the country. The Episcopalians, with a stir 
and enterprise quite new for them in America, are 
everywhere getting church sites, and advancing money 
for churches, missionaries and rectories. The Congre- 
gationalists, Presbyterians, and Baptists are imitating 
the early pioneer push and power of the Methodists, 
with sums of money which we never had, sticking their 
stakes and founding their churches as rapidly as possi- 
ble, and here and there, with more or less modesty, 
sometimes ordering us off their 'claims.' Indeed, the 
idea of ' preemption ' projects itself beyond landed 
estates." 

Thus it is that all the religious organizations rush 
in to secure the advantage of early settlement, and 
gain possession of the country, while we sit idly down, 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 1 25 

and fold our hands, and console ourselves with the as- 
surance that " great is the truth, and mighty above all 
things ; it must and will prevail! " 

Then look at Texas — as large as New York, New 
Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, and 
four-fifths of Illinois — a goodly land, into which is 
pouring a constant stream of immigration, and which 
will soon be of itself a grand empire. 

But we refer to these merely as specimens. The 
time would fail us to tell of Kansas, and Nebraska, 
and Minnesota, and Wyoming, and Colorado, of Cali- 
fornia, and Washington, and Oregon ; and even had 
we time and ability, it would be overwhelming; the 
very magnitude of the work before us would discour- 
age us. 

I. In regard to these vast home-fields, we desire to 
submit a few thoughts : 

1. It is a question which seriously affects the future 
of religion and of free government, whether the new 
communities in these vast territories are founded in 
the fear of God and the love of righteousness, or in 
godlessness and lawlessness. The character they first 
take on will be apt to remain for a long time. More 
can be done in a year for God and Christ and country 
at the start, in laying the foundations of empire deep 
and strong in the love of truth and righteousness, than 
can afterwards be done in twenty years in attempt- 
ing to overcome the evils and mischiefs of a wrong 
start. 

2. So far as our own plea is concerned, it has a 
comparatively easy task in new communities, where 
men are freed from their old surroundings, are hungry 
for instruction, and are ready to greet with earnest 



126 HOME MISSIONS, 

welcome the religious teachers who will share with 
them the hardships of frontier life, and bring to them 
the benefits of moral and religious culture. One dol- 
lar will go further in securing a good footing then, than 
one hundred dollars will go afterwards when the land 
and the hearts of the people are preoccupied. 

3. Do not forget that among those attracted to 
these new territories are thousands of our own breth- 
ren ; and that, unless they are cared for and helped, 
the majority of them will be lost to us, if not entirely 
to faith and righteousness. 

They will be swallowed up in other communities ; 
or, in their haste to be rich, will fall into temptation 
and a snare, and into foolish and hurtful lusts which 
drown men in destruction and perdition. Here and 
there will be found well established and unyielding 
souls, who will be themselves heralds of the faith and 
founders of society in their new homes ; and such in- 
stances are seized on and held up to view as triumphant 
demonstrations that missionary societies are needless. 
But let it be remembered that for one such instance 
there are scores of instances of failure and wreck, 
which suitable help and encouragement might have 
prevented. Not only for the sake of new and large gains, 
but to guard against heavy losses, we should have 
faithful preachers and teachers in all these new fields. 

There are thousands of lone and plaintive voices 
coming to us ; each from a separate Hagar in the wil- 
derness, pathetically pleading with us, for their own 
and their children's sake, that springs may be opened 
in the desert, lest they die. They are shut out from 
Christian fellowship. They have none to hold up 
their hands when they pray, and the Amaleks of 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. \2J 

worldliness and greed and folly are prevailing against 
them. They are longing and praying for the procla- 
mation of the blessed old gospel, and the singing of 
the songs of Zion, and the conversion of their neigh- 
bors ; but they long in vain. 

What are we doing ? To supply these vast fields 
and these millions of perishing sinners, we raise five 
thousand dollars per annum ! It were well nigh as 
sensible and as pious to hold our conventions at the 
base of the Rocky Mountains, and gravely unite in 
shooting paper wads from popguns to overturn them 
from their base, as to meet in grave council here and 
deliberate about missionary work in these great home 
fields on the strength of such an income. Bishop 
Peck said, in regard to Methodist enterprise in the 
Northwest : 

"The truth must be owned — the Methodists are 
behind in this part of the great Northwest, and are 
feebly struggling against great odds of men and money 
to begin our work in the rising settlements of this 
coming empire. I tell the Methodist people it is a 
shame that we have slept while others have sown good 
seed, and yet others abundance of tares, in this field. 
I have traveled and talked and prayed and preached 
from St. Paul to Bismarck, and north into the region 
bounding the British possessions, and I am pained, I 
am filled with indignation at our tardy, inefficient, half- 
dazed, snail-like movements in this competitive race of 
world-wide interest." 

If this can be regarded as a just censure, in view of 
what we know of Methodist enterprise, what language 
would suffice for a just expression of humiliation, 
mortification and shame, in view of our shortcomings ? 



128 HOME MISSIONS, 

II. But now, as to the means of overcoming our 
inertia, and starting us forward in a new career of 
missionary enterprise. This is really the essential 
point at present. It is needless to go into a further 
array of figures and facts. It ought to be regarded as 
an insult to the intelligence of this convention to at- 
tempt to prove the importance, the vital necessity of 
worthier effort in these great home fields, as if they 
did not know it, and feel it, and were not grieved and 
pained over our past inefficiency. But how to remedy 
our past inefficiency, is the grave problem. It is 
quite fashionable to say, just now, "Let us be done 
with talk about plans. We are tired of hearing 
about plans" This would be well if we had agreed 
on any one plan, and were really at work to execute it. 
What is called the "Louisville plan" never pleased 
me ; yet, when the brethren generally adopted it, I 
resolved to work in harmony with them, and did all I 
could to make it successful. And if we were working 
now on any well defined plan, I would do the same 
until it was fully tested, and say nothing about my 
own preferences. But the fact is, we are working ac- 
cording to no plan at all, and therefore we are working 
blindly and vainly. In name, we still adhere to the 
Louisville plan, so modified as to strip it of whatever 
vitality it might possess, and we are doing nothing 
worthy of mention. While I was, and still am, in my 
judgment, opposed to the plan, I am by no means cer- 
tain that it is best to abandon it without another effort 
to vitalize and utilize it. I see one way, and one way 
only, in which it can be made effective. When it was 
adopted, I urged on several of our state secretaries 
that the only chance for its success was to concentrate 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 



I2n 



attention and strength in its district feature, and work 
up the districts with all possible diligence. I still 
think so. 

Were I state evangelist in any one of our strong 
states, I would proceed in about this way : I would 
start out with a conviction that to be successful in 
raising money, I must get near to the people, and the 
only way to do this all over the state is by district 
organizations. I would divide the state into districts 
— small districts — with from twelve to twenty churches 
in each district. I would shape these districts, not 
necessarily according to county lines, but in view of 
the highways, the means of access by turnpikes, rivers, 
railroads, etc., grouping those which could most readi- 
ly cooperate. In each district I would persuade the 
churches, if possible, to employ one evangelist for the 
district ; not to divide his time as a preacher among 
the churches, but to work for the largest good in the 
district ; caring for the weak churches, getting idle 
preachers to work, holding protracted meetings at 
needy points, visiting the strong churches to get them 
to help the weak, and instituting and keeping up regu- 
lar quarterly collections in every church for missionary 
work in the district, the state, and the world at large ; 
his own salary having been previously agreed on by 
apportionment among the churches. Where districts 
would not or could not employ such an evangelist, I 
would have the churches select a board, say of one 
from each church, and a secretary who would make it 
his business to see that the quarterly collections were 
regularly taken up, and would feel it my duty to pay 
special attention to such districts, and foster them un- 
til they were prepared to employ an evangelist of their 



I30 HOME MISSIONS, 

own. Each of these districts should have a yearly 
meeting, made up of a large delegation from the 
churches, and attended as far as possible by the mem- 
bers of the churches to examine the work of the past 
year, and prepare the work of the coming one. 
The State Convention would then be composed of 
delegates from these district conventions ; would re- 
ceive from them the contributions of the districts for 
state and general purposes; would receive reports 
from all the districts ; would report on work done in 
the state, outside of the districts ; would appropriate 
out of its funds received from the strong districts for 
the help of the needy ones, and make such changes in 
or additions to the districts as, in the general judgment, 
should be deemed admissible. 

If an efficient state evangelist would thus work up 
his state, and make it his special business to see that 
the districts were kept at work until this became a 
settled system of working, I believe we might, from 
six or seven strong states, receive a missionary fund 
for general purposes that would enable us to help the 
weak states and do a good work in the new states and 
territories. In no other way does it seem to me pos- 
sible to operate on the plan which is nominally the 
plan under which we are now operating, or rather fail- 
ing to operate. 

If it is settled that this can not be done, that district 
work is a permanent failure, then the plan must be 
abandoned ; and the sooner the better. In that case, 
I see nothing but to fall back on the plan which ought 
never to have been abandoned — that of associations of 
individuals, as we now have it in the Foreign Mission, 
ary Society ; and if it comes to this, I see no good 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. I3I 

reason why the home and foreign work should not be 
again united in one society. But before any such 
change is contemplated, it should be definitely settled 
that district work can not be carried on in the way we 
have suggested. We deprecate any further changes 
if it is at all possible to succeed on the present basis. I 
believe that with state evangelists possessed of the 
organizing faculty, and gifted with the final persever- 
ance of the saints, it could be done, not all at once, 
but gradually ; and rapidly enough to tell effectively 
upon our treasury in a year or two. This, however, 
is only my own individual judgment. If it prove not 
to be the general judgment, then let us face the diffi- 
culty bravely, and devise some other means of effective 
work. 

With the return of prosperity to our country, we 
shall be without excuse if we fail to increase ten-fold, 
yea, twenty-fold, our contributions for the home mis- 
sion work in charge of this Convention. Like the man 
at the feast without the wedding garment, we shall be 
speechless when inquisition is made into our failure. 
We can give no reasonable apology for our existence 
if we fail to do according to our ability to redeem the 
world to God, and the failure will be traced at last to that 
most inexcusable of sins, indifference, alike to the love 
of God and the wants of humanity. No religious body 
has a right to exist unless it has some spiritual interest 
in charge for which others are not properly caring, and 
for which they are determined to provide. We are 
strong in the conviction that we have such spiritual 
interests in charge, interests that, to say the least, 
would be put in hazard if our advocacy were with- 
drawn. We are seeking to call the scattered people of 



Ij 2 HOME MISSIONS, 

God to the original unity and catholicity of the Church 
of God ; to overthrow sectarianism and denominational- 
ism, and to proclaim to the sinful and dying the pure 
gospel of the grace of God, unencumbered with and 
unembarrassed by the abstruse, perplexing, speculative 
and contradictory doctrines of various sects, and the 
commandments and traditions of men. That our work 
is distinctive, and essential to the vindication of a pure 
Christianity, worth living for, and, if need be, worth 
dying for — none of us, I presume, have a doubt. 

The question that remains is, Have we the courage, 
the zeal, the self-sacrifice necessary to guard the trust 
committed to us? 

We have reached a point in our history when this 
question must be met. It is vital in its bearings on 
our future. We are, in a sense, on trial before the 
world. In point of argument and success in making 
converts, we have so far succeeded as to challenge the 
attention and the respect of our religious contempo- 
raries, and of the onlooking world. 

Now, for its fruits. Will the principles and prac- 
tices for which we contend result in making men more 
godly, more humane, more philanthropic ? Standing 
on the Bible and the Bible alone, while the shackles of 
human authority are broken, will there still abide a 
power to unite Christians in all good works ? Or shall 
we confess, with the Bible in our hands, that it does 
not thoroughly furnish us unto all good works — that 
we are unable to unite our means and efTorts in any 
cooperative movement for the world's redemption ? If 
we fail here, the failure will be disastrous. And we 
will fail here, unless we rise out of the unfruitful experi- 
ments of the past into some form of cooperative effort 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 133 

that will command general confidence, sympathy and 
support. 

Pardon me if for once I seem to indulge in seem- 
ing censoriousness. I believe I can say with truth that 
I have never been a croaker in this camp. Through 
all changing fortune in our mission operations, I have 
kept good heart, and have withheld no labor or counsel 
or means at my command that would tend to inspire 
hope in others. If I seem to strike another keynote in 
this address, I ask you to believe that it is not from any 
decay of interest in our mission work, but from the in- 
creasing intensity of interest in it, and because I am 
fully persuaded that the time has come to face our re- 
sponsibilities squarely, and determine on an onward 
movement If, in probing the difficulty, it is found 
that we are lacking wisdom, then let us have a day of 
prayer, and ask Him who giveth to all liberally and 
upbraideth not. If we shall be compelled to the con- 
clusion that the real difficulty is a lack of heart in the 
work, a lack of consecration, then the sooner we know 
it, and humble ourselves before God in repentance and 
confession, the better. 

I do not lose sight of the fact that we are yet young ; 
that we are not rich ; that we have had and still have 
much to do in maintaining the cause where it is already 
established, and that for this purpose our outlays have 
been larger in the way of church-buildings, schools, 
colleges, etc. I do not therefore look for the large in- 
come to our missionary treasury that is seen in wealthier 
religious bodies. But surely five or six hundred thou- 
sand people are able, in addition to their expenses at 
home, to give ten times as much as we are now receiv- 
ing, yea, fifty times as much, and find it no burden. 



134 HOME MISSIONS, 

And remember we can not make a satisfactory demon- 
stration of the regenerating and sanctifying power of 
the principles for which we plead until this is done. 

I do not doubt that a part of our failure may be 
traced to the lack of proper consecration to the service 
of Christ. For myself, I am free to confess that the 
one thing that smites me with dumbness and over- 
whelms me with shame, and scatters to the winds all 
my confidence in my own. spiritual integrity, is to 
look at Him who, though He was rich, for our sakes 
became poor, that we through His poverty might be 
rich. In that wonderful presence, all my complacency 
vanishes, and what seemed the brightest passages in 
my life in the way of unselfish labor become dark as 
midnight, and I can only bow in the dust with broken 
heart, and cry with the publican — "God be merciful 
to me, the sinner." Yet I do not believe that this is 
the greatest of our difficulties. I do not think that, in 
this respect, we have occasion for a larger share of re- 
proach than all who love the Lord must feel when they 
look at their best performances in the light of that 
example. I believe that, more than to any other cause, 
our feebleness is owing to a lack of wisdom in devising 
proper methods, joined to a lack of that love which 
will command all individual preferences into submission 
to the general good, and inspire us to unite on any 
plan, in any way, that will help the good work onward. 

Solomon said, ' ' The words of the wise are as goads. ' ' 
I do not pretend to wisdom ; I am willing, indeed, to 
be counted a fool for Christ's sake, if only my words 
may prove as goads to urge you to grapple with the 
difficulties of the situation and master them. Let us 
rise to the demands of the occasion. If, under divine 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 135 

direction, we shall be able to decide on the measures 
that will ultimate in sending forth scores and hundreds 
of preachers into the vast home fields that now invite 
us, the memories of this occasion will be green and 
fragrant for generations to come. 



A VIEW OF THE HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

And of the Divine Objects thus far Developed by 
Him who Rules the Ages and the Nations. 

Young Ladies and Gentlemen : 

In honoring me with an invitation to deliver the 
annual address before your literary societies, I presume 
you have had a higher object in view than a mere 
amusement for the hour. At least, in accepting your 
kind invitation, I have done so from a conviction that 
an opportunity would be afforded me to impress some 
of the great and earnest lessons of life on the hearts of 
many young men and women who, in a very few years, 
are to be active workers in the great fields of humanity, 
in this most stirring and glorious age. With me, life 
is an awful, earnest, glorious thing, especially in this 
age and in this land. I have no respect for anything, 
except as it contributes to a true life. I attach no value 
to education, except as it furnishes the means and the 
inspirations to develop, control and energize heart, 
conscience and life, so as to make manhood and 
womanhood true, pure, and noble ; and, by a wise 
economy, enables the possessor of this brief life to 
marshal its forces for the most effective and honorable 
performance of life's great task. We have but one life 
to live here. In it are wrapped up the destinies of the 
eternal future. The saddest and awfullest of all failures, 
therefore, is to fail of a true life — for from it there is 
no recovery ; out of it there is no redemption. It sinks 
the soul in a hopeless bankruptcy, where there is no 

compounding with creditors, no opportunity to regain 

i 3 6 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. I 37 

lost ground, no opening of the prison doors to a new 
career of wiser experiment. Deeply do I feel, there- 
fore, in behalf of the young, to whom the paths of 
responsible life are just opening, and who are putting 
forth their inexperienced feet toward life's great path- 
way, to join the mighty throng who are working out 
the awful problem of character and destiny ; deeply do 
I feel for them, and I desire to aid them in a proper es- 
timate and plan of life, and help them to such an un- 
derstanding of themselves and of the age as may 
enable them to look intelligently and wisely upon their 
duties and responsibilities, and accept 'with brave and 
holy resolution the solemn and mighty task that God 
has set before them. But this is no easy matter. It 
is easy enough to tell one to understand himself, 
and to understand the age, and all that, but to be able 
to reach such an understanding is another thing. 

This age is the product of all past ages. The peo- 
ple who now live are not merely human beings, born 
into the world with the common capacities and endow- 
ments of our nature, but the legitimate heirs of the im- 
mense treasures of intellectual and moral wealth which 
the past has bequeathed, and of all the holy duties 
which that past enjoins. Lord Bacon truly says, ' ' We 
are the ancients. " We are older than any who have 
preceded us. We can not, therefore, understand our- 
selves except as we understand the past; nor our age, 
except as we comprehend the designs and marches of 
the ages that have gone. The burden of this address, 
therefore, as preparatory to the great practical lessons 
which we wish to enforce, will be a view of the history 
of our race, and of the divine objects thus far de- 
veloped by Him who rules the ages and the nations. This 



138 HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

we will make as brief and as rapid as possible. And as 
I am addressing those who are accustomed to look be- 
neath the surface, and search for the roots of things, I 
shall not fear, as I might before some audiences, the 
charge of dullness or prolixity. If, occasionally, I 
lead you by a path that seems sinuous and unpromis- 
ing, it will soon guide you into some sweet valley of 
serene beauty and freshness ; if, sometimes, it calls you 
to steep and rugged ascents, be sure that when you 
gain the summit of the inquiry it will open such ex- 
tensive and sublime scenes of contemplation as will 
abundantly compensate for all the toil of the journey. 



When Napoleon Bonaparte was banished to the little 
island of the sea, and his spirit of boundless ambition, 
like a caged lion chafed and maddened in its confine- 
ment, roared in vain for deliverance, he turned in bit- 
terest despair from a starless future, and said, ' ' Let us 
live upon the past." This was a vain effort. It is 
impossible that any earnest soul should satisfy itself 
with the past. The future — the limitless and eternal 
future — glowing with innumerable stars of promise, 
where the angel of hope, with lively pencil dipped in 
gayest colors, paints visions of grandeur and blessed- 
ness of which the past knoweth not; and points to 
heights of glory, crowns of victory, and scenes of 
felicity, such as eye hath not seen nor heart conceived — 
this is the source of delight to a nature whose every 
ambition and aspiration tells of immortality. The past 
Is too sober, too tame, too real. There is a charm in 
the deceitful mirage in the desert of life, which kindles 
new hopes, tempts us on to new efforts, and involves 
us in new disappointments. We are not apt to turn to 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. I 39 

the past, until, like the son of ambition of whom we 
have spoken, the spell that links us with the future is 
broken, and the enchanted scene in which we have 
reveled melts away, and is succeeded by Egyptian dark- 
ness. Yet the study of the past is profitable; profitable 
as it relates to our individual lives ; profitable as it re- 
lates to the lives of nations, and to all the develop- 
ments of humanity in the history of our race. As a 
source of profit and, we may venture to hope, of 
pleasure also, we propose to listen, in the present 
lecture, to the voice of history. 

There is a tendency to discard the past ; to talk of 
it as a region of shadows, of spirits and hobgoblins ; as 
a long reign of night, during which humanity was be- 
stridden by some ugly fiend, and groaned in horrid 
nightmare, out of which, in this glorious age, it has 
just awakened, and gathered up energy enough to re- 
move the incubus and emerge from the agony. Now 
we beg leave to submit that, according to the lowest 
computations, the human race is well nigh six thousand 
years old. And if nearly six thousand years have 
passed without substantial results, there is certainly 
little hope for the future. If a childhood running 
through six millenniums has developed nothing but 
idiocy and insanity, alas ! for all our dreams of prog- 
ress. ''The child is father of the man;" and there 
is nothing to do but consent that this ricketty, creak- 
ing, jarring, crazy world shall be kept on hand for- 
ever as a mad-house for an unfortunate and imbecile 
race; and amidst the antics, and riotings, and swell- 
ings, and tumults of lawless humanity, trust our 
keepers to hold us within some bounds, or let 
Angels and ministers of grace defend us." 



I4O HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

No, it will not do to ignore the past. The anti- 
historical view of humanity is most unphilosophical. 
The future will be the product of the past. "What 
hath been is now, and what is to be hath already been ; 
and God requireth that which is past." Every rational 
scheme of human progress must be grounded on an 
historical view of human nature. If there has been no 
divinity shaping the ends of human history; if society, 
as now existing, is the result of blind and senseless 
combinations ; the mere upheaving of a sea swept by 
lawless storms, then we can profit little by the study 
of the past, and as little by any plans for the future. 
But if there has been an overruling providence in the 
affairs of men, guiding on the movements of individ- 
uals, tribes and nations to an intended consummation, 
then the study of history is one of the most important 
to which we can devote our attention, and the future 
is only to be correctly viewed in the light of the past. 
In this view the pages of history bear traces of the 
handwriting of Jehovah. Somewhat like the palimp- 
sests, from which ignorant men erased the most valu- 
able records to give place to senseless legends, on 
many of these pages of time the handwriting of Deity 
is defaced and almost obliterated, and can only be 
traced here and there, underneath the confused his- 
tories and false philosophies of men. Yet enough can 
be recovered, perhaps, to understand the intentions of 
the divine Author. In the midst of the darkness that 
hangs over the past, enough stars are yet seen shining 
above the eastern horizon to furnish a correct horo- 
scope ; and in the study of these we learn to prognosti- 
cate truly the coming fortunes of our race. This is the 
only true view of history. It can not be that God has 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. I4I 

arranged the material universe with so nice a regard to 
order, and with so exact a balance of forces, and then 
left the intelligent nature, for which it was all made, 
ungoverned. It can not be that dateless ages were 
employed in preparing the globe to become the habita- 
tion of man merely to furnish a Bedlam where a crazy 
nature might be free to play its pranks, and mar with 
horrid discord the otherwise pure harmonies of the 
rational universe. Rather let us believe that in the 
grand oratorio which heaven has composed, and for the 
performance of which all orders of intelligences are 
placed under tribute, man has an important part as- 
signed him ; and if, sometimes, he strikes a discordant 
note, it is only as a foil; if, sometimes, he appears 
out of time as well as out of tune, it is in fugue per- 
formances ; and that in the end these apparent clashings 
will make more rich and charming and triumphant the 
full swelling harmonies and melodies of the clashing 
strains, when the universe shall resound with the mag- 
nificent utterance of praise, and men and angels shall 
sing the most perfect chords, and sinners and devils 
shall beat silent beats, and never utter another discord 
more! 

Let us look, then, after a satisfactory view of history. 
It is observable that the mightiest results are wrought 
out quietly by unobtrusive agencies. The destinies of 
nations frequently hang on a look, a word, a single act. 
Gibbon has noted a moment in the life of Mohammed, 
when the lance of an Arab might have changed the 
destinies of the world. And taking into view the 
whole subsequent history of Mohammedanism, it is 
curious to look back and reflect how different the fate 
of Europe and Asia might have been, had there been 



H 2 HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

a single movement of that lance, numbering Moham- 
med with the slain. Hence we learn that if the Divine 
Ruler governs at all in the affairs of the world, he must 
govern the very smallest events ; and there is such a 
thing as a special providence. He not only 

11 Sees, with equal eye, as Lord of all, 
The hero perish, and the sparrow fall ; " 

but is able to make the falling of a sparrow or the 
weaving of a spider's web the occasion of mighty 
changes, which in time may convulse the world. But 
we can not, in the limits of a lecture like this, pause to 
trace out these details, or pursue to their sources the 
little rills which, combined, form the larger streams of 
history. We only propose to note results — the con- 
clusions growing out of an acquaintance with these de- 
tails. We can only look at the mountain summits, 
where are seen the "footprints of the Creator," and 
trace the majestic marches of providence in the onward 
progress of the ages. "The adventurer in Central 
America, after climbing over range after range of vol- 
canic hills, rising one above another, stood at last on 
the dividing summit, from which he could view both 
oceans at once," So is there a dividing line in history 
— a lofty summit from which to look into the eternity 
past, and the eternity to come. The ages of the past 
stretch away into remote and unrecorded antiquity, 
and the ages of the future lie before us, stretching out 
into a distance impenetrable to human gaze ; and many 
richly freighted argosies are making their way over the 
deep, perhaps to some secure port, perhaps to wreck 
and ruin. 

That dividing line is the establishment of Christianity. 
All things in former ages tended to that one event. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 143 

All things since are tending onward to another event, 
yet future — the subjugation of the whole world to the 
peaceful and blissful reign of the Messiah. 

The progress of nations from barbarism to the high- 
est civilization is marked by two words — Poetry and 
Philosophy. The first awakening of the mind is marked 
by poetical fervor and brilliancy. Rude ages have 
always poetical inspiration in them. Traditions, moral 
lessons, religion, and even laws, are full of poetical 
breathings. As civilization advances, the poetical 
gives place to the philosophical, and the realms which 
have sparkled and glowed and blazed with a thousand 
glorious imaginations are invaded by the stern and 
cold materialist, who, with pickaxe and shovel, and 
hammer and crucible, reduces all the universe to 
weight and measurement, exorcises all the demons, 
and drives away all the fairies, elves, sprites and 
nymphs that used to people forest and field, and 
river and sea, until, in dull materialism of rigid science, 
we sigh again for the wildness and grotesqueness and 
excitement of 

" the merry olden time, 
When the fairies were in fashion, and the world was in its 
prime." 

Unquestionably, the union of poetry and philoso- 
phy is necessary to realize the most healthy and benef- 
icent influences on the human mind, and this is what 
religion furnishes. Religion is, indeed, the union of 
poetry and philosophy. To recognize God philosophi- 
cally, as a cause uncaused, or an absolute essence with 
certain qualities and relations, and then poetically as 
manifested in the ten thousand forms of life and beauty 
and glory around us, that we may worship Him with 



14 \ HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

mind and heart and strength, is the lofty purpose of 
religion. Religions are more or less perfect, accord- 
ing to the proportions of these which enter into the 
combination. Hence in idolatrous religions we have a 
vast preponderance of the poetical — the philosophical 
element being almost entirely banished. In theism 
the philosophical prevails, and the poetical is last. 
But Christianity is at once the highest philosophy and 
the highest poetry. It is the union of these in fault- 
less proportions. It is, therefore, that on which, a 
priori, the highest forms of civilization and human pro- 
gress depend ; and, a posteriori, that to which all in 
former ages was tending, as the embodiment of all the 
heart seeks after in intellectual vigor, moral purity, 
and spiritual loveliness. Indeed, as one author has 
justly remarked: "The history of Christianity, in- 
cluding the life and death of its divine Founder, the 
moral heroism of its martyrs and apostles, and the long 
warfare which it has waged against ignorance, sin and 
misery, is a mighty epic, of which God is the Author, 
and the refinements of chivalry, the triumphs of art, 
and the glories of science are the episodes." Taking 
Christianity, then, as "the summit level of the line of 
communication opened between earth and heaven," 
and tracing back from Rome the streams of art and 
knowledge, we pursue them through Greece, Asia 
Minor, and Phoenicia to Egypt and the plains of Chal- 
dea. The modern progressive, who glories in the 
philosophies of to-day, will be astonished to find these 
streams so clear and fresh and strong at their sources. 
In place of leading him back to ages of barbarism and 
tribes of savages, they lead him back to empires of 
might, to seats of learning and science, to monuments 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 145 

of greatness which are still the wonder of the world. 
His own ideas are but grains of gold washed down from 
ancient mines, in which patient laborers wrought ages 
before he was born, and fashioned the material into a 
thousand glorious and immortal forms, which, but for 
his near-sightedness, he might have been profitably 
employed in studying. If he looks at Rome, all that 
Rome could glory in was imported — even her most 
wonderful monuments, her literature, science, and re- 
ligion. If to Greece he turns his eye, her teachers 
traveled to the East to gain their knowledge. Or- 
pheus, Rhadamanthus, Minos, Lycaon, Triptolemus, 
Solon, Pythagoras, Plato, all went to Egypt, and im- 
ported thence their theology, philosophy, and learn- 
ing. Egypt was the seat of learning and refinement, 
and her very ruins are eloquent in praise' of her great- 
ness. Babylon, with her gates of brass, and temples 
and towers, was the center of learning and science. 
Her sages had counted every star in the oriental 
heavens. Language, art, science and religion have 
all come down to us from these ancient nations, from 
the ages which we are so prone to ridicule and con- 
temn. Could we be cut off from all the patrimony 
which those ages convey to us, we should be little bet- 
ter than grinning, chattering monkeys, for whose ex- 
istence nature could scarcely furnish an apology. 
"The Indians, Egyptians and Phoenicians, before the 
Greeks and Romans, made very great advances in 
geometry, astronomy, natural history, philosophy, 
language, politics, oratory, and the fine arts of archi- 
tecture, sculpture, painting, poetry, and music." 
Back of all these, before the light of profane • history 
had dawned, the sacred volume opens to view patri- 



I46 HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

archs and seers who lived in communion with God, in 
whom the divine afflatus lodged the ideas, reasonings, 
eloquence, poetry, and refinements of the heavens. 
They were representative men who gave birth to ages 
and nations, and from whom have descended, through 
the various ramifications of Noah's family, the original 
inheritance of language, science, and art. Jacob and 
his family brought all this rich patrimony into Egypt. 
It was some little time after this that Cadmus, with his 
Phoenician colony, founded Thebes, and Cecrops and 
Danaus, with their Egyptian relations, founded Athens 
and Argos, carrying with them the science and learn- 
ing of Egypt into these new states. 

But without pausing to speak minutely of these 
patriarchs, and of the ancient Persians, Chaldeans, 
Indians, and Egyptians, and the causes of their de- 
clension — for their progress, especially in morals, be 
it observed, was a progress downward and backward, 
and not upward and onward — we remark that, as they 
declined, a few small tribes immediately around the 
Mediterranean were made the chosen depositaries of 
the elements of progress. The structure of modern 
society had its foundations laid in those remote ages 
by the Hebrews, Greeks, Romans, and Germanic 
nations. With the Hebrews, God deposited moral 
and religious truth. To the Greeks he assigned the 
empire of reason and imagination. And to the Ro- 
mans, military genius and prowess, by which, with 
their civil institutions, and the literature and religion 
of the other two nations, they were to lay a broad 
and deep foundation for the Christian civilization 
on which the Germans were to build the modern 
world. 



AND OTHFR ADDRESSES. 147 

The heroic ages of Greece gave birth to a poetry 
and a religion whose influence on the intellectual and 
spiritual culture of mankind has never yet been spent. 
Their idolatries, and the noble deeds of heroes, wrought 
up by Homer into immortal song ; the victories of fee- 
ble bands over Persia's innumerable forces ; the glories 
of Marathon, Salamis, and Thermopylse ; the splendid 
life of Pericles; the teachings of Socrates, and kindred 
causes, gave birth to that great army of poets, philoso- 
phers, historians and rhetoricians who conquered the 
conquerors of the world, and made the Greek literature 
one of the chief sources of modern culture. But while 
we look to Homer and ^Eschylus as the fathers of epic 
and dramatic poetry, let us not forget the great masters 
in philosophy, Aristotle and Plato, whose influence 
was felt, not only in those ages, their teachings follow- 
ing the conquests of the Roman arms everywhere, and 
gaining an intellectual sovereignty more absolute than 
the political dominion which the Romans wrested from 
the Greeks, but in after times also, when, in the mid- 
dle ages the Grecian literature was again revived, and 
gave fresh vigor to the reawakened mind of the world. 

Another power, very unlike the Greeks, arose from 
obscurity, marked peculiarly by invincible military 
spirit. Poor, illiterate, unrefined, the Roman people 
grew up and passed through all their changes of gov- 
ernment, and all the chances of fortune, possessed of a 
solitary idea, that of conquest. Whether under kings, 
decemvirs, dictators, or consuls; in the midst of 
plenty or of famine ; reposing in peace, or drenching 
their own streets with the blood of brethren ; invaded 
or invading, it was all the same ; an invincible determi- 
nation never to yield and always to conquer, bore them 



I48 HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

on to unparalleled triumphs, and justified the prophetic 
symbol of Daniel, of a monster exceedingly great and 
terrible, which under the tread of iron feet broke in 
pieces and devoured the residue of earth's kingdoms. 
Then we have the Hebrews, presenting the singular 
spectacle of a semi-barbarous nation in possession of 
the purest morals and the best religion the world had 
ever known. We can not here speak much of their 
mission. It was, in some respects, a bloody one ; so 
much so, that many recoil from the thought of such 
blood-stained enterprises having the sanction of Jeho- 
vah. It is, however, a mawkish sensibility. These 
very sensitive philosophers and moralists must needs 
go out of this world, at least, to get rid of such un- 
palatable facts, for what is seen in the history of the 
Jewish people is seen, more or less, in the history of 
all peoples. Everywhere that God's providential hand 
is seen are witnessed murders, and famines, and pes- 
tilences, and strifes and agonies, and great ends made 
to grow out of all these. It is so to this day, and 
will be so till the moral and spiritual faculties prevail 
more fully over the selfish and carnal feelings and pro- 
pensities of our nature. The moral as well as the 
physical universe has its thunders and lightnings, and 
floods, and tempests, and earthquakes. Every great 
principle and every great movement struggles into life. 
But apart from this, let us note that through this peo- 
ple the doctrine of the unity of God, correct views of 
moral duty and obligation, and the capital idea of re- 
demption, were preserved from ruin, amidst the clash 
of arms, the overturnings of empires, the speculations 
of philosophy, the charms of mythology, and the gross 
superstitions of idolatry; and not only preserved, 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 149 

but by means of their colonies and their captivities, 
carried to the great centers of science, commerce, 
and government, and diffused among idolatrous na- 
tions, so as to turn attention to a particular age, a 
particular country, and a particular people, when, 
where and through whom a better system of things 
should have birth, for the regeneration of human nature. 

Accordingly, when Rome had extended her military 
triumphs on every hand, and established a vast empire ; 
when Grecian literature and science had gone with Ro- 
man arms and conquered the conquerors, and softened 
the rudeness and sternness of a warlike people ; when 
Judaism had diffused the knowledge of God and of a 
coming Redeemer, and when, in Rome herself, all fac- 
tions had been subdued, and the republic had given 
place to the empire ; when the municipal institutions 
and laws of Rome, and the literature and laws of the 
Greek and Latin languages were beginning to mould 
all the subject nations into one homogeneous civiliza- 
tion, and thus build up all around the glorious Medi- 
terranean a magnificent theater for new and mightier 
evolutions of the purposes of God, and the destinies of 
man ; then appeared that Deliverer, whose birth marks 
the most glorious era in the annals of humanity, and 
whose religion is destined to pursue its way to univer- 
sal triumph, and consummate its earthly history in the 
glories of a millennial reign. 

I am aware that in making this the great dividing 
line in history the results of the introduction of Chris- 
tianity may not, to many minds, seem to justify it. 
We are told that the dark ages have been since then. 
There has been no steady onward progress ; humanity 
has undergone its most terrible oppressions in Christian 



l S° HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

ages and countries ; and Christianity itself has degen- 
erated into a fierce spiritual despotism. Listen, then, 
while we attempt, in the light of history, to vindicate 
the new religion from these aspersions. That Christi- 
anity has not been uniformly prosperous, is admitted ; 
it has to be admitted of every system the world ever 
knew. But look, in this case, at the reasons : 

I. The ancient civilization was in its dotage. The 
sturdy virtues of primitive times had given place to 
effeminacy and debauchery, and the moral condition of 
the most enlightened portions of the world was most 
deplorable. The various conflicting sects of philosophy 
had little moral power. Like the cold pale moon- 
beams which sometimes encompass with rainbow beau- 
ties the roaring cataract of Niagara, throwing arches 
of triumph over the eternal tumult, and spanning the 
scene of uproar and madness with their mild fascina- 
tions, the light of human philosophy rested on the 
tide of human passion, and gave beauty and fascination 
to the foaming, dashing, leaping, tumultuous currents 
of superstition and vice, which it could not arrest in 
their resistless outpourings, nor even cause them, like 
the tides of ocean, to ebb and flow under a benign 
heavenly influence. The Epicurean philosophy pre- 
vailed. The republic had been supplanted by the em- 
pire. Even the military prowess of former ages was 
decaying, and it required the infusion of new life from 
some source to save civilized humanity from sinking 
into a bottomless pit of perdition. In view of such a 
moral condition of human nature, the new religion did 
work wonders. Its new ideas of "the fatherhood of 
God, and the brotherhood of man ;" its sublime devel- 
opments of divine love ; its matchless purity ; its 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 15 I 

charming revelations of a lofty and blissful immortality, 
won for it amazing victories. The empire of spiritual 
darkness, which had defied the assaults of philosophy, 
gave way before the humble men who planted the 
cross on the ruins of the Pantheon, and transferred the 
sovereignty of the moral world from the cloudy 
Olympus to the bloodstained Calvary. 

2. Then came the irruptions of hordes of northern bar- 
barians. There was design in all this. Strange as it 
may seem, those very irruptions prepared the way for 
our liberties. Yet, for the time, they necessarily 
checked, and almost destroyed, the advances of the 
Gospel. It is true that as conquered Greece gave her 
literature to Rome, so conquered Rome gave her reli- 
gion to those barbarian conquerors. But it was the 
work of ages to elevate them. They were rude, fierce, 
sensual, lawless. They had been accustomed to the 
wild excitements of the chase, to predatory warfare, to 
perpetual broils, to midnight revels. They drank their 
beer out of human skulls ; and their religious hope was 
that if they fell in battle "they would be carried im- 
mediately to the star-paved halls of Valhalla, where, in 
the presence of Odin, the god of war, they should sit 
down to the feast of heroes, and drink oceans of beer 
out of the skulls of their enemies." With these men 
for subjects and for civil rulers, religion had an almost 
impossible task to perform. Their translation from the 
cold rude North to summer climes, amidst the luxuries 
and profligacies of the decaying empire, was not at all 
favorable for their religious growth. Christianity modi- 
fied itself to meet these exigencies ; and the growth of 
papal authority was not without the plea of a necessity 
of the times. The ecclesiastics of those ages were 



152 HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

necessarily the depositaries of learning ; and although 
sharing in the vices of the times, they were generally 
much in advance of the people and of the civil authori- 
ties. When kings and nobles were fierce and reckless 
oppressors, the church was generally on the side of the 
people. The priests alone could hold these lawless 
men in subjection. There were no books ; intellectual 
pursuits did not please barbarians. The preservation 
of learning, and the erection of barriers against the 
desolating vices of the times, seemed to require just 
such a centralization as took place in the church, at the 
sacrifice of its original simplicity and democracy. That 
this was afterwards abused, with the increase of wealth 
and power, is only to say what has been demonstrated 
a thousand times, that whether in church or state, on 
the part of individuals or societies, human nature can 
not be safely trusted with great affluence, or with irre- 
sponsible authority. Still, we wish to say, in opposi- 
tion to much Protestant declamation, that the history 
of the Roman Catholic Church is not all dark. She has 
many glorious records. The conversion of the barba- 
rians, her missionary enterprises, her protection of 
learning, her rebuke of royal and imperial oppressors, 
her lessons and practical exemplifications of humanity 
and mercy, did much for the rescue of the world from 
barbarism, as well as from the corruptness of the old 
civilization. 

Another great service rendered by the church was 
the preservation of the municipal institutions received 
from pagan Rome. The municipal mode of life became 
a passion with the Romans. "Ancient Italy alone 
contained eleven hundred and ninety-seven cities; 
Gaul boasted of twelve hundred ; Spain of three hun- 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 153 

dred and sixty ; three hundred African cities at one 
time acknowledged the authority of Carthage ; and in 
the time of the Caesars, Asia Minor alone counted five 
hundred populous cities. Here were but five members 
of the Roman empire, a mere fraction of its territory, 
containing thirty five hundred and fifty-seven cities. 
These cities, through priestly influence, were preserved 
from the destruction to which the barbarians would 
otherwise have doomed them. They became the cen- 
ters of ecclesiastical power. They were also the nurs- 
eries of the arts. They were the seats of trade and com- 
merce. And, more than all, they were, in the peculiar 
structure cf their internal police, the nurseries of free- 
dom ; and became the strong bulwarks of liberty 
against the attacks of kings and emperors. 

The rise of Mohammedanism is not without signifi- 
cancy. It was not all imposture. It was better than 
that which it supplanted. It embodied many noble 
ideas of God, of truth, of justice. It had infused into 
it a poetical enthusiasm which lends much of refine- 
ment to it. Learning and science also are somewhat 
indebted to these Arab conquerors for services rendered 
to an ignorant and besotted world. Mohammedanism 
had sometimes more of generosity about it than some 
of the forms of Christianity against which it was 
arrayed ; and even in our own day, in conflict with a 
Christian power, it was so far in advance in acknowl- 
edgement of the true doctrine of civil and religious 
liberty, and in the justice of its cause, that the sympa- 
thies of the best part of Christendom were given to 
the crescent rather than the cross. 

Chivalry — "the poetry of arms" — which derived 
much of its refinement of valor from the Mohammed- 



154 HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

ans, did much for society. It has been described as 
' ' the martial enthusiasm of the terrible warriors of 
Germany, refined by the poetry of the Arabs, and 
exalted by the great moral ideas derived from Christi- 
anity." But we can not stop to speak of this, nor of 
many earlier and later agencies in the recovery of 
human society from the thraldom of the dark ages; 
the Justinian Code, the revival of learning, the cru- 
sades, the spirit of commercial enterprise, the compass, 
printing, and gunpowder, the discovery of America — 
every one of which played an important part in lifting 
up humanity from the stagnation and darkness of the 
middle ages. Neither can we speak as we ought of the 
scholastic philosophy, the intellectual sway of Aris- 
totle, of such pioneers as Alfred the Great, and Thomas 
Aquinas, and Duns Scotus, who unconsciously opened 
the way for after struggles, bold marches, and despe- 
rate encounters of mind, in which, host encountering 
host, carried on a mighty warfare, and out of which 
Freedom grew into new life, and, we hope, immortal 
vigor. We merely note these as topics which the stu- 
dent of history should ponder well. 

The reformation of Luther was the result of these. 
It was the product of ages. Before Luther, all these 
influences were at work, and Wickliffe, and Jerome, 
and Huss, and the Waldenses and Albigenses, had 
sown, in tears and blood, that after generations might 
reap in joy. Luther was but the embodiment of the ten- 
dencies of the times. His work was wonderful ; he was 
wonderfully trained for it. His protest was not a mere 
protest of Germans against certain dogmas and abuses 
of Rome, but the protest of human nature, standing in 
the light of God, and lifting up its hand to Heaven, 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 155 

against priestcraft, kingcraft, laycraft — against all 
monopolies of religion, learning, and authority. It was 
a giant stride of humanity towards its true destiny. 
It had in it the germs of all true progress. It was the 
awakening of human nature from the troubled sleep of 
centuries, during which it had been growing in help- 
lessness under a terrible incubus. And, newly awak- 
ened, with all the horror inspired by its fresh recollec- 
tions of the torments of this night-fiend of religious 
tyranny, it swore, on the Holy Bible, by the God who 
alone is worthy to reign over the soul, that it would 
make war on all tyranny forever ! That the Reformation 
has done much to emancipate the human mind, none 
can doubt. In its wake have followed intellectual, 
social, political and moral results, which we can not but 
contemplate with admiration. 

And allow me here to say that the name of John 
Calvin is scarcely less illustrious than that of Martin 
Luther, albeit his memory is linked with a sterner the- 
ology. All truth has a negative as well as a positive 
pole, a repelling as well as an attractive power. And 
the Calvinistic battery, curiously constructed, when 
surcharged with its terrible logic, and sparkling and 
flashing with the awful justice of an unchanging God, 
if touched by profane and ignorant hands, is apt to give 
a fearful shock, not easily forgotten. Yet no adherent 
of that creed has any reason to be ashamed of its his- 
tory. Calvinism is identified with the progress of 
modern freedom in all its stages. It had its birth in 
Republican Geneva ; and among the Presbyterians of 
Scotland and Holland, the Huguenots of France, and 
the Puritans of Old and New England, it has ever 
shown its hate of tyranny, and its devotion to the true 



156 HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

interests of liberty. They felt themselves to be "the 
sacramental hosts of God's elect," who, under the out- 
spread wing of the immutable Jehovah, by whom they 
had been called to glory and courage, dared to do bat- 
tle against the sons of Belial. For that peculiar stage 
of the world's history, no creed was so well calculated 
to give birth to true heroes and to work out great 
results. 

In England we find a peculiar population, made 
ready to receive the benefits of this regeneration of 
mind. The Celtic population, whose " mercurial tem- 
perament, marked by quickness, vivacity, and thought- 
less enthusiasm, is still seen in France and Ireland, and 
still marks all their unproductive efforts for freedom," 
gave way in England, first to the Saxons, and then to 
the Normans. These German tribes we have alluded 
to, in their original wild barbarism and independence. 
We have briefly noted their conversion to Christianity, 
and the influence of ages of ecclesiastical rule. These 
people with, first, their native firmness, energy, love 
of freedom, and indomitable perseverance; second, 
the softening and refining influence of Christianity ; and 
third, the intellectual and moral quickening of the 
Reformation, are clearly the dominant race of the 
world. The union of the people and the nobles against 
the intolerable tyranny of the Norman kings, paved 
the way for Magna Charta; and, favored by the insular 
position of their country, which made them less liable 
to the invasion of foreign foes, and left them less at the 
mercy of their monarchs in times of peril, the Anglo- 
Saxons, or more properly the Anglo-Normans, carried 
on a persevering warfare which resulted in the consti- 
tutional liberty which the British nation now enjoys. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 157 

Thus we trace from the forests of Germany, where our 
naked ancestors drank out of human skulls, through all 
the changes of so many ages, the development of those 
peculiar features of character which, as a race, we 
inherit, and which have made our country and govern- 
ment what they are. 

It has been truly said, by a modern writer, that if 
we would "possess just and comprehensive views of 
American society, of that singular compound of race, 
of genius, and of character, which now individualizes, 
distinguishes, and elevates the American family, we 
must not only begin with the decline and fall of the 
Roman empire, but push our inquiries to the ancient 
lands of the Huns, the Goths, the Vandals, the hun- 
dred tribes and nations of ancient Germany, and Asiatic 
Scythia : we must visit the plains beyond the Oxus and 
the Jaxartes ; we must go to Mt. Caucasus, and trace 
the meanderings of a hundred rivers, along plains five 
thousand miles in length and one thousand in breadth, 
before we find the germs of our own greatness, the 
root and origin of our own family, and the causes of 
the political institutions, manners and customs of our 
own country." 

The destinies of the world are now -largely in the 
hands of the Anglo-Saxons. This conquering people 
have the following elements of permanent greatness : 

1. An unconquerable energy and perseverance, 
which seem to grow with their growth, and strengthen 
with their strength. 

2. An inheritance in the portion of the world most 
favorable to physical, intellectual and moral develop- 
ment. 



1 58 HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

3. The principal treasures of literature, science and 
art. 

4. The possession of the greatest practical talent. 

5. The most free and enlightened governments. 

6. The best educated population. 

7. The largest share of the commerce of the 
world. 

8. A language — certainly one of the noblest of liv- 
ing languages — constantly spreading over the world, 
and promising to become universal. 

9. The largest military skill. 

10. The purest forms of religion. 

We have thus glanced over this vast field, and 
taken observations enough to show that history is not 
entirely a tangled web — a rude chaos ; but that amidst 
all the appearance of disorder and confusion there is 
order and design ; and that all the busy and tremen- 
dous scenes of time are unfolded with more and more 
clearness a promise of the world's redemption. God is 
in history — 

" From seeming evil still educing good, 
And better thence again, and better still, 
In infinite progression." 

Let us briefly note, in conclusion, some results 
drawn from the facts and evidences in our field-view. 

1. The modern progressive philosophy is built on a 
baseless assumption. The idea of a gradual, regular, 
constant growth of humanity from a low animal life, is 
not sustained by history. The development, by any 
innate force, of faculties and powers, every increasing 
in strength, is unsupported by testimony. It is a mere 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 1 59 

imagination. There is not on earth the history of a 
single tribe or nation which by its own unassisted 
efforts ever made one step in the career of intellectual 
and moral improvement. In every case, nations, if 
left to themselves, deteriorate. Savages are only 
brought up by foreign aid ; civilized nations are only 
kept up by an infusion of foreign influences ; and the 
present highest civilization of the earth did not make 
itself. As we go up towards the original fountains of 
history, we do not approach monkeys and savages, but 
nations farther advanced in intellectual and moral at- 
tainments than their successors. 

2. We should learn patience as the wheels of the 
car of improvement move tardily on. 

The facts of history admonish us not to expect 
rapid onward movements. The tribes of humanity, 
like the tribes of Israel, may be kept a long time 
in the wilderness, wandering round and round, ere 
they reach the land of promise. It is enough if 
they have the pillar of cloud and fire to direct their 
journeyings, and the angel of Jehovah's presence to 
go with them. This globe swung lazily in its orbit 
for ages while growing up into a home for the human 
race ; what wonder if the marches of humanity should 
be slow for ages more, and be sometimes checked 
by counter-marches which the shrewdest of earth's 
soldiery can not guess the meaning of until the cam- 
paign is over. The world was four thousand years 
old before Christianity was revealed ; and at the end 
of eighteen centuries and a half that religion num- 
bers but a small majority of the human race among 
its votaries. 



l60 HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

Guizot, in his great work on the civilization of 
modern Europe, in speaking of the slow movements of 
European society, says its history ' ' may be thrown into 
three periods. First, a period which I shall call that of 
origi?i or formation, during which the different elements 
of society disengage themselves from chaos, assume 
an existence, and show themselves in their natural 
forms, with the principles by which they are animated. 
This period lasted till almost the twelfth century. The 
second period is a period of experiments, attempts, 
gropings ; the different elements of society approach 
and enter into combination, feeling each other, as it 
were, without producing anything general, regular or 
durable. This state of things, to say the truth, did 
not terminate till the sixteenth century. Then comes 
the period of development, in which human society in 
Europe takes a definite form, follows a determined 
direction, proceeds rapidly and with a general move- 
ment towards a clear and precise object. This is the 
period which began in the sixteenth century, and is 
still pursuing its course. 

It is not worth while to get out of humor with the 
world because it will not quicken its pace to please us. 
It is all in vain. It will jog on its own way; and after 
we have fretted and worried over it until our strength 
is gone, we have not mended it in the least. We must 
take things as they are. And our labors for the regen- 
eration of the race must be taken in a wise compre- 
hension of the present bearings of society ; the present 
latitude and longitude of the vessel in which we are 
sailing. 

In our own country everything is pitched on the 
principle of compromise. Our constitution is a com- 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. l6l 

promise between slaveholding and non-slaveholding 
societies ; between centralization and state rights ; be- 
tween progress and conservatism. The love of equi- 
poise is a characteristic of the Saxon mind. It was the 
nice sense of equilibrium, his perfectly poised character, 
which gave our beloved Washington his greatness ; and 
in this he was but the perfect embodiment of the 
principles and tendencies of his age and country — 
principles and tendencies which gave a permanency to 
our revolutionary movement, to which France, with her 
destructive rather than constructive spirit, could not, 
with all her military prowess, and learning, and genius, 
attain. And our second Washington — the martyred 
Abraham Lincoln — had his great secret of power in the 
perfect balance of his character. He was great not in 
any one particular, but in the happy equilibrium of 
his powers; now putting on the brakes to check the 
too rapid movement of radicalism ; anon spurring up 
the cautious conservatives by a timely bold stroke of 
reform ; but in all cases keeping his steady eye on all 
sides of every question, and moving only at the right 
time. It is this magnificent combination of qualities 
which causes him to be mourned by the whole civilized 
world. 

Whatever we may suppose to be the mischiefs of 
this prevailing spirit of compromise, we can not help it. 
It is a stubborn fact found on all the pages of Anglo- 
Saxon history. Idealism on one hand, and a dull, 
leaden materialism on the other, have never marked 
the doings of this race. A safe, moderate, practical 
spirit of reform is its characteristic. Whoever pre- 
sumes to rush too fast will have the satisfaction of 
ending his days in doleful lamentations over the hope- 



162 HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

lessness of the condition of society. Whoever, on the 
other hand, presumes too far on the spirit of modera- 
tion, and seeks to abase it to unworthy ends, will rouse 
a spirit of resistance which he can not tame. It were 
easier to calm the ocean than to smooth the indignant 
swellings and heavings of Anglo-Saxon society when 
this long forbearance has been too far abused. The 
present developments in our own land but confirm the 
truth which stands forth on all the pages of English 
history; and admonish us to guard against the Scylla 
and Charybdis which threaten our ship of state ; namely, 
an extreme radicalism, whose triumphs are always 
short and disastrous, and an extreme conservatism, 
which like an ostrich buries its head in the sand, and 
refuses to see the danger and the duties of the hour. 
3. We learn the certainty of progression; not 
from the new-fledged theories of yesterday ; not from 
the results of any one age or country, but from the 
connected view of historical events of all ages and na- 
tions. And it is one of the advantages of an enlight- 
ened view of history that it prepares us to accommo- 
date ourselves to this forward movement, and forbids 
us to struggle against the resistless tide of events. It 
is not possible to be believed that we have reached the 
height of the civilization to which the ages have been 
pointing. Guizot — himself surely sufficiently conserv- 
ative — says : ' ' Society and civilization are yet in their 
childhood. However great the distance they have 
advanced, that which they have before them is incom- 
parably, is infinitely greater." Who that looks at the 
supreme selfishness yet reigning, the fierce competi- 
tions, the huge oppressive monopolies, the wild spirit 
of speculation, the oppression of the poor, the extrava- 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 163 

gance of the rich, the abominable vices yet approved 
or winked at, slavery, duelling, war, and the rampant 
spirit of conquest, can doubt that even the best Chris- 
tian society is yet in its infancy ? Sacredly as we may 
cling to the present or the past, we are admonished 
not to cherish more than a pilgrim's admiration and 
love for that from which we must soon pass away. It 
is said that sailors coming over the ocean drink, the 
first halt of the voyage, to friends astern, and the latter 
half of it to friends ahead. It is well to remember the 
friends astern ; they who too easily forget the friends 
left behind will not be apt to prove true friends ahead. 
Yet if a voyager knows he must be separated from 
former friends and scenes, 't is not worth while to sit 
forever in the stern of the vessel, and snivel and weep 
life away in vain regrets over a dead past. Yet such is 
the folly of the rigid and croaking conservative, who 
is forever reminding us that the former days were 
better than these, and sullenly refusing to see anything 
in the future but fearful portents of storms, earthquakes, 
and every possible disaster. Living in the days of 
Jesus, he would have been a dignified Pharisee ; in the 
days of Luther, a defender of indulgences ; in Eng- 
land's struggles, a conformist ; in the Revolution, a 
Tory ; yet the world has lived through all the fears and 
forebodings of the enemies of progress, and we humbly 
opine will live on still, and move on still, till the hun- 
kerism of to-day shall be laid up among archaeological 
remains, as a curiosity over which the hero of a thou- 
sand years to come may amuse himself, and from which 
he may seek to demonstrate to the fearful of that 
period how vain and empty are their forebodings. 
We would not forget friends astern, when half way 



164 HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

over the ocean ; we would never forget them, but we 
would sometimes go to the masthead and look out for 
land ahead. The mutineers in the crew of Columbus, 
who were bent on a return from a fruitless search, 
have sunken into eternal nothingness. The glorious 
man who still held on his way till the joyful cry of 
Land! rewarded his anxious toils and sacrifices, won an 
envied immortality. 

Let us, then, in this broad view of things, have 
heart to labor in the day that belongs to us. With 
the rich heritage of the past, the stars of promise that 
burn so brightly in the future, and the inspirations 
and opportunities that belong to this wonderful pres- 
ent, let us labor with good heart to bring order out of 
Time's confusions, harmony out of its discords, and 
peace out of its conflicts, until the whole mighty scene 
of human toil and strife shall be flooded with millennial 
glory, " and earth keep jubilee a thousand years." 

Before I conclude, let me say a few words touching 
the lesson for ourselves in this age and this country. I 
have already alluded to the origin and peculiar charac- 
teristics of the Anglo-Saxon race. They are the most 
wonderful people on earth, both for increase and for 
energy. In Britain the population doubles itself in 
35 years; while in Germany it requires 76; in Hol- 
land, 100; in Spain, 106; in Italy, 135; in France, 
138; in Portugal, 128 ; and in Turkey, 555 years. In 
1620, at the time of the landing of the Pilgrims, the 
Anglo-Saxons only numbered six millions, and were 
confined to England, Wales, and Scotland. Now they 
number about seventy millions, planted on all the 
continents and islands of the earth. At their past rate 
of increase, they will in less than one hundred and fifty 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 1 65 

years number one hundred millions. They have, at 
this time, a merchant fleet of ten million tons burden, 
and govern one hundred and seventy-five millions of 
the population of the world. By -1900 they will proba- 
bly number at least one hundred and fifty millions, and 
if they gain control of India and China, will govern six 
hundred millions of human beings. Into the original 
composition of this race entered all that was vigorous 
in the Celt, the Scandinavian, the Saxon, and the 
Norman. 

But in this country of ours it is adding to its 
original vigor by much larger mixture with the most 
vigorous races and nations of the old world, whose 
hardy sons and daughters flock here in myriads for a 
home of freedom. The sturdy and obstinate English- 
man ; the brawny and astute Scotchman ; the genial 
and generous Irishman ; the tough and fiery Welsh- 
man ; the little, nimble, mercurial Frenchman ; the 
broad-shouldered and imperturbable children of Ger- 
many ; the gay and artistic Italian ; the hardy sons of 
Norway and Sweden ; no inconsiderable sprinkling of 
Spanish and Portuguese; the ingenious and unique 
Chinese ; the cosmopolitan, money-loving and money- 
making Jew ; almost everything comes in here to 
blend their races and their interests with ours, until 
like the Corinthian brass, formed from the fusion of 
various melted metals, we produce a type of humanity 
the most valuable the world has ever yet seen. At 
the end of the present century we shall have in these 
United States a hundred millions of inhabitants, and 
four hundred and twenty thousand millions of taxable 
wealth, with the freest institutions and the grandest 
territory that God ever gave to a nation. 



1 66 



HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 



With all these advantages, our mission is to develop 
before the world the capacity of man for self-government. 
The peculiar feature of our government is that it puts 
confide7ice in human nature ; not in princes or poten- 
tates, popes or clergy, states or congresses, but in 
the people , and our work is to show before the whole 
king-ridden and priest-ridden world the spectacle of a 
mighty, free, prosperous, educated Christian nation, 
where the people govern themselves. Lord Macaulay, a 
year or two before his death, uttered some doleful 
prognostications touching the fate of our country. He 
thought he saw, in the absence of any conservative 
aristocratic class, the certain downfall of our govern- 
ment, as soon as an overcrowded population should 
assert their irresponsible democracy in tumults and 
riots and intestine feuds which there would be no hand 
of power strong enough to control. Great men are 
not always wise. He did not know that even when he 
was writing we were just on the eve of the most awful 
intestine strife ! And it serves to show how ill-informed 
was his judgment, that this strife came not from the 
people whom he so feared to trust, but from the slave- 
holding aristocrats and would-be oligarchs of our land ; 
and that the people have been true to the holy demands 
of the laws which themselves had made. What a grand 
demonstration of the capacity of our people to govern 
themselves has the history of this rebellion furnished ? 
An enormous conspiracy burst in its terrors upon us, 
when we had no preparation for it ; no army, no navy, 
no money. What had we ? We had the people with 
strong arms and willing hearts, who soon rallied and 
furnished an army and navy, which for brains, and 
culture, as well as for bravery and skill, never had its 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 1 67 

equal ; and in four years they have made a history 
which embraces more of invention and of revolution in 
war and in statesmanship than is generally to be found 
in any hundred years of the world's history. But 
where could the government get money for the unex- 
ampled outlays necessary for this war ? Money to be 
estimated no longer by hundreds of millions, but by 
billions? The people gave the money! The farmer, 
the mechanic, the factory girl, the kitchen maid, the 
seamstress, the day laborer, along with the merchant 
and the manufacturer, opened ten thousand rills, 
through which all that was needed poured in on the 
national treasury until the world looked on in astonish- 
ment to see a nation that had its seat of power in the 
hearts of millions, its strong arms of defense in half a 
million of her own sons, and its treasury in every purse 
in the land. And who ruled over this nation through 
all this scene of darkness and of peril, and guided the 
ship of state gallantly and safely through the breakers, 
and subdued this awful mutiny? One of the people, a 
big-fisted, unfashionable, unaristocratic, but long-head, 
ed, honest hearted, well balanced, fatherly man, with 
a single eye to duty, an abiding confidence in the peo- 
ple, and an honest trust in God. Thirty-five years 
ago, the hand that penned the emancipation proclama- 
tion might have been seen swinging the maul in his 
honest task of rail-splitting, and bringing it down with 
as hearty a vim as that which has since split the head 
of treason, and shivered the Rebellion into a thousand 
splinters ! And that man of the people, victorious 
against everything but the stealthy stroke of cowardly 
assassination, was followed in funeral procession by six 
millions of people, and was laid to his glorious rest 



1 68 HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

amid the tears and lamentations of a whole nation — 
nay, amid the unexampled sorrow and mourning of the 
civilized world ! Emperors, kings, nobles, cabinets, 
senates unite with the masses of the people, and with 
four xnillions of emancipated slaves, to do honor to the 
memory of the once humble rail-splitter, but now and 
forever the second Washington, the redeemer of his 
country, the emaneipator, the pacificator, the martyr- 
statesman of his age ! 

And who now sits in the presidential chair? A 
child of the people. A child of poverty and of toil ; 
who grew up amid the struggles of hard but honest toil, 
amid the oppressions of supercilious and purse-proud 
aristocrats, until in every drop of his blood, and every 
fibre of his body, and in the very marrow of his bones, 
there was deposited a hate of privileged orders, and a 
scorn of aristocratic pretensions. Learning his A, B, 
C's from his wife, he has made glorious strides, through 
manly toil and honest devotion, to a place where there 
are more millions waiting on his word than on that of 
any living man. The potentates of earth are watching 
to catch every hint that falls from his lips. And this 
people, covered with the glory and armed with the 
power of lawful victory, with a martyr from their own 
ranks for whom all the world weeps, and another from 
their own ranks on whose word all the world is wait- 
ing, are now the sublimest spectacle, politically, intel- 
lectually, and morally, that the world presents. 

The downfall of the Rebellion is not only the down- 
fall of slavery ; it is the downfall of aristocracy ; it is the 
noblest triumph of true democracy. The leaders of the 
Rebellion were not men of the people. They were the 
pets of blood, of wealth, of slave-despotism. They 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. l6o 

were men who sneered at republican government ; who 
only valued laborers as mudsills of society; and who 
were never so enraged as in contemplating the thrift, 
intelligence and wealth of the masses of the free states. 
Under the courtesy and polish of external refinement, 
they concealed a bitter scorn and hate of the plebeian 
throng ; and hoped that with cotton for king, and negro 
slavery for the corner-stone of a new social structure, 
they would be able to flaunt in the face of the civilized 
world, with reckless impudence, a wealth and a power 
which would sanctify all the wrongs of oppression, and 
justify all their contempt of northern mudsills. Poor 
fellows ! How their scornful lips have been made to 
bite the dust ! How has their king been dethroned ! 
How has the corner-stone of their new edifice been 
ground to powder ! How have their proud hearts been 
broken, as the old hunters of fugitive slaves have been 
chased over their own sacred soil, themselves fugitives 
from the eager pursuit of negro soldiers ! We do not 
rejoice over a fallen foe, but we do rejoice over the 
downfall of this enormously wicked pride, this vaulting 
ambition, and all the treachery and cruelty and per- 
fidy that were wedded to it. 

We have suffered as only the Anglo-American race 
could suffer, through this tremendous strife, and have 
borne, as no other people would have borne, its wrongs 
and its burdens. But the people have triumphed. 
The cause of republican liberty stands before the world 
to-day stronger and more hopeful than ever before- 
May you, young men and women, understand your 
mission as you enter the great harvest fields which the 
tears and blood of the past and the warm sunlight of the 
present, have ripened for your sickles, and in this broad 



170 HISTORY OF OUR RACE, 

view of things, have heart to labor earnestly and hope- 
fully for the regeneration of humanity. Only let us 
work out the problem to its full issue honorably. 



THE LESSONS OF A CENTURY. 

An Address before the Cecropian Society of Ken 
tucky University, Dec. 22, 1881. 

Mr. President, Members of the Cecropian Society, 
Ladies and Gentlemen : 

Was there ever a century so crowded and burdened 
with wonders, so ablaze with glories, since the world 
began ? Not to speak of our own country in particu- 
lar, but of the world at large, what beneficent changes, 
what magnificent strides have been made, out of dark- 
ness into light, out of weakness into strength, out of 
oppression into liberty, out of political, social and ec- 
clesiastical degradation into something of the dignity 
and freedom and joyous hopefulness of true manhood ! 
It is just a century, I think, since the first attempt at 
steam navigation in American waters. And I may state 
here that in my boyhood, about half a century ago, the 
only ferry-boat we had at Pittsburgh was a flat-boat 
poled across the river, and a large part of the freighting 
of the Ohio river was done by keel-boats, rowed down 
the river to Cincinnati and Louisville, and poled up. 

Steamboats, steamships, steam printing presses, the 
cotton gin, railroads, locomotives, the telegraph, the 
telephone, the spectroscope, and the almost innumer- 
able applications of steam power, electricity and mag- 
netism, with their prodigious multiplications of power, 
all belong to the century of which we speak, not to 

speak of the vast marches in astronomical and meteor- 

171 



i; '2 LESSONS OF A CENTURY, 

ological science. By virtue of these, man has been 
lifted into godlike grandeur and potency, so that he 
conquers time and space, rules the winds and waves, 
flashes intelligence round the world in an instant, un- 
locks the forces of nature and enlists them to do his 
bidding, harnesses the lightning, subsidizes the oceans, 
plunges into the fires of the sun, and compels it to dis- 
gorge its secrets, brings suns and planets and stars un. 
der his sovereignty, riding sublimely in the chariot of 
science far up the Milky Way, and hanging the banner 
of victory on the outer walls of millions of worlds that 
own him conqueror. If he has not yet tamed the 
storm-fiend, or cured the earth of its tremendous shakes, 
he has at least stripped them of half their terrors, and 
he is rapidly fulfilling the grand purpose of his ex- 
istence, as announced by one of the sacred writers : 
"Thou madest him to have dominion over the works 
of Thy hands." 

This vast increase of power, and its employment in 
ministering to the wants of humanity, is itself an im- 
mense civilizer; and in connection with moral causes 
and providential inventions in the affairs of men, neces- 
sarily tends to bring the various nations of the earth 
into closer contact, into mutual relations, and into 
greater or less fellowship of ideas and interests ; so that 
the ideas of liberty, of the dignity of human nature, of 
the value of man as man, and of human brotherhood, 
force their way into the dense ignorance of the past 
with illuminating and vivifying and regenerating power. 
Hence the changes of the century in the governments 
of the earth have been great, and generally hopeful. 
The gates of the Celestial Empire are opened to the 
outside barbarians ; and had it not been for the in- 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 1^3 

famous opium trade forced on her by the accursed 
greed of a professedly Christian nation, the effects of 
contact with Christian civilization would have been 
much more marked and beneficent than they now are. 
Japan has risen, as if by miracle, out of her grave of 
heathenism, and is rapidly adjusting herself to the de- 
mands of a new civilization. Africa has had the vail 
of darkness that concealed a great continent, of almost 
boundless resources, lifted away, and Livingstone and 
Stanley and others have opened the gates of empire to 
the Christian nations of earth. Russia, in spite of all 
that is forbidding in the despotism that still reigns, and 
in the nihilism which it has engendered, has really made 
wonderful progress. The emancipation of forty mil- 
lions of serfs and crown peasants is one of those 
events which, in connection with many other imperial 
measures of reform, tell unmistakably of emergence 
into the light of the present century. Italy has thrown 
off the shackles of politico-ecclesiastical dominion, and 
attained to a unity and a freedom that are full of 
promise. France has fought tremendous battles with 
the forces of civil and ecclesiastical despotism, and has 
borne herself so wisely, and used her victories so pru- 
dently and skillfully, as to give strong hope that the 
republic will live and prosper. England has been un- 
dergoing slow but steady progress, such alone as the 
Anglo-Saxon mind will permit — so slow that we are 
scarcely sensible of it, yet so sure that it can not be 
arrested, until she is found now on the borders of a cer- 
tain revolution on the land question, if not on the 
question of a union of Church and State ; impelled by 
the slowly accumulated forces which can not be re- 
sisted, and which leave to her statesmen only one path 



174 LESSONS OF A CENTURY, 

to glory — that of leading the onward movement pru- 
dently and in good faith, step by step, until the rights 
of the people are fully established. Germany and 
Austria show fewer signs of change in the right direc- 
tion, not because revolutionary forces are not at work 
there, but because the strong hand of imperial govern- 
ment represses for the present the manifestations of the 
spirit and sentiment of the people. Even Spain is 
waking out of her lethargy, penetrated by the light of 
the age, which no civil or priestly authority can quench. 

I may add that the Bible societies and foreign mis- 
sions belong to this century. The translation of the 
Bible into hundreds of languages and dialects, and the 
establishment of missions in all parts of the world, 
until converts are numbered by myriads, and the serv- 
ices rendered to humanity by turning cannibals, base 
idolators and brutal savages into gentle, humane and 
industrious subjects of law, and humble followers of 
Jesus ; and the service rendered to literature and 
science and commerce by the discoveries and labors of 
missionaries, has won the tribute of praise from en- 
lightened statesmen, and Christian missionaries are 
coming to be recognized as important factors in the 
world's progress. Within this century, also, the slave 
trade has been practically put down, and slavery has 
been abolished over almost the entire world, and phil- 
anthropy, in a thousand noble and beautiful forms, and 
with organized forces, has asserted a faith in a common 
humanity and the ties of a common brotherhood, as 
the world never saw it before. 

Let us say, in closing this general survey, that in 
all this wonderful progress in discovery, in invention, 
in philanthropy, in the development of science and the 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 175 

practical arts, in statesmanship, and in moral and re- 
ligious reform, this country, alike in leadership and in 
working forces, occupies among the nations of the 
earth an honorable position, and furnishes in some de- 
partments names as illustrious as any in the world's 
history. 

Coming now from this general survey to a more 
special view of our own country's progress, it is difficult 
to believe, even when dealing with cold statistics, that 
we are not indulging in a fairy dream. 

We said in the outset, that the experiment of self- 
government made in this country was a bold one. It 
was more than this — it was sublimely daring. It ex- 
hibited a faith in human nature that can not be called 
other than sublime. I am aware that it was not the 
offspring of a day, or of any particular brain ; but the 
ripe fruitage of that tree of liberty rocked by the 
storms of centuries, and watered by the tears and 
blood of patriots and heroes for generations ; and 
which only needed to be transplanted to the west- 
ern world to attain a growth and a ripeness and a 
largeness of fruitage, in a virgin soil and a free at- 
mosphere and an unclouded sun, which it could 
never reach under the shadow of thrones, or in the un- 
friendly atmosphere of courts, or under the frowns of 
State churches. I do not forget that the long, heroic and 
successful struggle for constitutional liberty in England 
prepared the way for our revolutionary struggle ; nor that 
the glories of the Dutch Republic gave inspiration to out- 
revolutionary sages and patriots. I am not unmindful 
that, back of all these, there were forces at work in 
Europe for ages — subterranean currents that flowed 
unknown until they came to the surface and burst forth 



l 76 LESSONS OF a century, 

with living power in England and in this country. I am 
even disposed to say that ever since Christ deposited 
the leaven of his doctrine concerning God and man in 
the hearts of men, there has never been an hour when 
the hopes of freedom were dead ; and that all that is 
comprehensive and ennobling in the American doctrine 
of freedom can be traced back to that heart that bled 
on the cross of Calvary "for every man," and to that 
Gospel which, dipped in His blood and inspired by the 
Holy Spirit, proclaimed a philanthropy which could 
have originated only in the heart of God: "Go into 
all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature. " 
Still, I say, the American experiment was daring. The 
history of the world, unless read by an eye of faith 
and interpreted in the light of divine philosophy, did 
not justify it. The history of former republics did not 
justify it. The theology of the church did not justify 
it. The kingcraft and priestcraft that sat astride the 
heart of humanity, and filled the world with the groans 
of a horrid nightmare, were tremendous potencies in 
opposition to it. That human nature, so depraved as 
it was held to be, could be trusted with freedom ; that 
the masses so long held in chains, as incapable of free- 
dom ; as born to serve the favored few who were 
anointed to "rule them legitimately by the grace of 
God," and had for ages been stifled, cramped, per- 
verted and crushed under the heel of despotic authority, 
could be safely freed from their fetters and be trusted 
in the free air and warm sunshine of republican liberty, 
to govern themselves and to grow into strength and 
dignity and nobleness, and at their own instance and 
of their own free election ordain laws and establish in- 
stitutions for the promotion of the general welfare, and 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 177 

maintain their freedom against all the world, and thrive 
and prosper until the world should be compelled to re- 
spect them, and honor the flag in every sea and in 
every port around the world ; this, we say, was a bold 
faith, and to put it to the test was a daring experiment. 
But the experiment was made, and now, a hundred 
years after the surrender of -Cornwallis at Yorktown — 
a surrender that made this experiment possible- — let us 
see what is the result. 

The territory ceded by England in 1783 was 815,- 
615 square miles. Our present territory is 3,578,392 
square miles. It has been more than quadrupled. 
Counting the water surface, it is over 4, 000, 000 square 
miles. It is estimated that our natural resources, fully 
developed, would afford sustenance to nearly five 
billions of inhabitants, or about four times the present 
number of people existing on the globe. 

In 1775 the population was 2,389,300. It is now 
more than 50,000,000.* 

We had originally thirteen states ; we have now 
thirty-eight, f 

Of railroads, of course, we had none a century ago, 
and as late as 1849 we na d but 6, 117 miles; while the 
length of railroads built in the year 1881 was 6,113 
miles — lacking only four miles of the extent of rail- 
roads in the entire country thirty-two years ago. In 
1881, or January 1, 1882, the railroad mileage of the 
United States was 104,813 miles. In 1882 the length 
of railroads built was about 12,000 miles. The length 



* The census of 1890 gives 62,622,250. 

t Forty-four states, five territories, not including the District of 
Columbia or Indian Territory. 



I78 LESSONS OF A CENTURY, 

of railroads is now 116,000 miles, representing a capi- 
tal of #4,250,000,000, with aggregate gross earnings 
last year of #675,000,000; and we have 122,000 miles 
of coast and river navigation, and six thousand miles 
of canal. X 

As late as 1783, there was not a daily paper in the 
entire country. One paper had been started as a tri- 
weekly, but failed, and changed to a semi-weekly, and 
then to a weekly. There were but forty-nine news- 
papers established in the colonies from 1748 to 1783, all 
weekly or semi-weekly publications. It was in 1784 that 
the first daily was started, in Philadelphia, and the sec- 
ond in New York, in 1785. Until 1786 there was not 
a newspaper printed west of the Allegheny Mountains. 



Number of daily papers,! 

Tri-weeklies, 

Semi-weeklies, 

Weeklies, 

Semi-monthlies, 

Monthlies, 

Bi-monthlies, 

Quarterlies, 

Total, 



574 
107 

115 

4,295 

96 

622 
13 
49 

5.871 



X The railway mileage of the United States on June 30, 1890, waa 

163,597- „ , T 

i« No. of Issues 

Weekly - 14,000 1,385,189,000 

Tri-weeklies 46 7.566,000 

Semi-weeklies - - 238 45,162,000 

Semi-monthlies 327 35,700,000 

Monthlies 2,625 140,817,000 

Bi-monthlies - 76 997,5oo 

Quarterlies. - - ---- i3o 1,807,000 

Bi-weeklies - 90 5,466,500 

Dailies I.79 1 2,397,720,000 

Total 19.473 

— American Newspaper Directory, r8gt. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. I fg 

But this gives a very inadequate idea of the mighty 
progress in this department. We have to take into 
view the difference in size, in circulation, in variety of 
information, in the ability employed ; and when these 
are taken into account, it is very difficult to grasp the 
thought of the growth of the century in the means of 
information. 

There is more valuable information contained in a 
single issue of some of our modern newspapers, and of 
infinitely greater variety, than could be packed away in 
a whole year's issues of the weekly papers of a century 
ago. And then, as to circulation, the entire circulation 
of all the newspapers and periodicals we have men- 
tioned was in 1870, 20,842,475, which would be about 
six apiece to every inhabitant of the United States, man, 
woman, and child, one century ago. The number of 
copies annually issued by those papers and periodicals, 
was 1,508,548,250. The number of copies issued by 
the daily press was 800,000,000 ; of weeklies, 600,000,- 
000; of all other publications, 1,000,000. Look at it! 
In 1775, the number of papers and periodicals, 37; in 
1870, less than a century, 5,871. In 1775, the number 
of copies annually printed, 1,200,600; in 1870, 1,508,- 
548,250! 

Then take into account the learning and ability em- 
ployed to instruct the people through the press, the 
intelligence from all parts of the world, only a few 
hours old ; the reports of lectures and sermons, and re- 
views of books ; the discussion of all questions in articles 
which, within a column or two, often condense all of 
value on a given subject to be found in the large libra- 
ries ; the logic, the rhetoric, the wit, the humor, the 



l80 LESSONS OF A CENTURY, 

sarcasm, the forcible and eloquent writing, as well as 
the embodiment of all these in the cartoon, and you 
will begin to have a faint idea of the marvelous growth 
in the means of public information. Think of the re. 
vised New Testament telegraphed from New York to 
Chicago, and a large part of it published in a single 
issue of a daily paper, along with a variety of other 
matter, and you will have some idea of that matchless 
enterprise which makes out daily a bill of fare embrac- 
ing intelligence from every part of the world, and an 
almost endless variety of the best thoughts of the best 
minds in every department of literature, science and 
art, and puts it on your breakfast table for half a dime, 
often sending it hundreds of miles and delivering it be- 
fore you are through with your morning nap. 

I have not spoken of books, nor will I tax your time 
and patience to do so, for I am only presenting such 
specimen facts as will outline the progress of the 
century. 

But I must pause long enough for you to get some 
grasp of the thought of the tremendous power operat- 
ing on society through the press. It was Jefferson who 
said, "I would rather live in a country with news- 
papers and without a government, than in a country 
with a government and without newspapers." And 
none was better capable than Napoleon I. of knowing 
the correctness of his own utterance when he said, 
" Four hostile newspapers are more to be dreaded than 
a hundred thousand bayonets." It ought not to be 
surprising, therefore, that we get along without a stand- 
ing army ; for we have enough newspapers to answer 
the purpose of millions of bayonets in maintaining the 
peace and order of society, and in putting down any 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. l8l 

dangers that threaten our safety, our freedom or our 
prosperity. 

"Give me but the liberty of the press,' ' said Sheri- 
dan, "and I will give to the minister a venal House of 
Peers, I will give him a corrupt and servile House of 
Commons, I will give him the full sway of the patron- 
age of office, I will give him the whole host of minis- 
terial influence, I will give him all the power that place 
can confer upon him to purchase up submission and 
increase resistance ; and yet, armed with the liberty of 
the press, I will go forth to meet him undismayed ; I 
will attack the mighty fabric he has reared with that 
mightier engine ; I will shake down from its height cor- 
ruption, and bury it amidst the ruins of the abuses it 
was meant to shelter. " 

If such the omnipotence of the press, surely we have 
in this country the most ample means of perpetuating 
our free institutions, and of conserving every interest of 
a free people. 

The latest report of the Bureau of Education,* pub- 
lished in 1882, places the number of students in Ameri- 
can colleges and universities at 61,740; of whom 42,- 
338 are males, and 19,402 females. The number in 
preparatory schools of all grades is given as 30,297. 
In the 142 schools of theology the number of students 
reported is 5,093 ; in schools of law, 3,134; in schools 
of science, 5,100; in medical schools, 9,876. The 

♦Number of scholars in public schools, 1891 12,291,259 

Number of scholars in private and parochial schools 1,500,000 

Number of scholars in intermediate, private schools 140,000 

348 universities 86,996 

141 theological colleges 6,989 

52 law colleges .. 3.906 

92 regular ") C 12,238 

9 eclectic V medicaW 669 

14 homoeopathic J (^ i>*59 

198 female colleges 26,945 

*39 Indian schools ",55* 



1 82 LESSONS OF A CENTURY, 

grand total of students reported in the advanced schools 
of the country is, therefore, 115,240. The number en- 
rolled as pupils in the public schools is given at 9,781,- 
521, with an average daily attendance of 5,805,242. 
The whole number of persons receiving instruction in 
all the various schools of the United States is not far 
from 10,000,000. This includes freedmen and Indians — - 
all classes for whom provision for instruction is made. 

It is a century since the first English Bible printed 
in America was launched from the printing house of 
Robert Aiken, in Philadelphia, and the first vessel of 
war built by the Government of the United States was 
launched from the Portsmouth Navy-yard. 

One other point we ought to notice, that is the 
moral and religious progress of the century; especially 
as we have not a few whose piety is chiefly expended 
in croaking, and in mournful inquiries why the former 
days were better than these. We talk of the infidelity 
and the drunkenness of the present time, and they are 
certainly serious obstacles to true progress ; but at the 
close of the revolutionary war intemperance was a much 
more formidable evil than it is now, and so was infidel- 
ity. From Rev. Daniel Dorchester's book called "The 
Problem of Religious Progress," and other sources, the 
following conclusions have been carefully reached. 

In 1800 the population of the United States was 
about 5,500,000. In 1880 a little more than 50,000,- 
000. In 1775 there were 1,918 church organizations 
in the country. In 1870 there were 54,914; in 1880, 
97,090. In 1775 the ministers numbered 1,435. ^ n 
1880, 69,870. In 1800, of members of evangelical 
churches there were 364,872. In 1880, 10,065,963. 
In 1800 there was one evangelical communicant in 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 1 83 

14.50 of the whole population. In 1850, one in 6.57. 
In 1870, one in 5.78. In 1880, one in 5. While the 
inhabitants of the country increased beyond all 
parallel in the world's history, the members of these 
churches not only kept pace with them relatively, but 
far outsped them.* The former advanced 9.45 fold ; 
the latter 27.58 fold, or almost thrice as fast. 
Moreover, " the increase of communicants from 1850 
to 1880 was more than twice as large as the increase 
from 1800 to 1850. The last thirty years, there- 
fore, have been the period of the grandest progress, 
both relatively and absolutely." 

Then think of the Bible societies, missionary so- 
cieties, publication societies, Sunday-schools, and the 
various forms of benevolent and reformatory organiza- 
tions and agencies, all of which are the creation of this 
century, f There are some twenty foreign missionary 
boards in the United States, supporting about one 
thousand missionaries in foreign lands, and about forty 
home missionary organizations, supporting nearly ten 
thousand laborers in domestic missionary work. There 
are in the United States, 84,730 Sunday-schools, 932,- 
283 teachers, and 6,820,825 scholars. One Bible 
society alone issued, in a period of fifty-nine years, 
J > 893, 332 Bibles and Testaments, for home and 
foreign circulation. When you add to these about 
nine hundred collegiate institutions, most of them 

* In 1890 the membership of the most important Protestant 

churches, as compiled in the New York Independent, was : 

Methodists - - 4,980,240 

Baptists... 4,291,292 

Presbyterians -.1,229,012 

L u therans 1,086,048 

Congregationalists 49 I >9 8 5 

Episcopalians 480, r 76 

Reformed German and Dutch 282,856 

Friends 106,930 



1 84 LESSONS OF A CENTURY, 

under religious control, and one hundred and twenty- 
three theological institutions, with permanent funds 
of over eight million dollars,* and thousands of stu- 
dents yearly, preparing to become religious teachers 
and missionaries, and that the amount of benefactions 
to the various benevolent and educational institutions 
amount to probably from $15,000,000 to $20,000,000 
per annum, it will be seen that the moral and religious 
forces now at work are by no means insignificant, 
while there is unquestionable room for enlarged benef- 
icence and increased activity. It is said that for edu- 
cational purposes alone the benefactions for fifteen 
months ending June, 1881, amounted to $19,000,000. 
This may be an exaggerated statement. But the readi- 
ness and extent of benevolent contributions of late 
years is among the most cheering signs of the times. 
In ten years, 1871-80, the private benefactions for 
education were $10,000,000. Our public schools re- 
ceive about $100,000,000 per annum, and of this the 
western states expend about $36,000,000. 

I have gone about as far as the limit of this address 
will warrant in furnishing statistics outlining the prog- 
ress of a century. I ought to add that the assessed 
value of property in the United States is $16,877, 135,- 
567, f being $336.87 per capita for the whole popula- 
tion ; and that does not express more than half its real 
value ; and that of $118,000,000* in gold produced in 

*In 1889 the universities had an income of $3,444,100, exclusive of 
the regular income. 

f The assessed value of the property in the United States in 1890 
was $24,249,589,804. The estimated value of the property in the United 
States in 1890 was $66,000,000,000. 

X The value of the gold mined in the United States in 1880 was 
$36,273,690. The value of the silver mined in the United States in 
1888 was $59,097,523- 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 185 

the world in 1880, nearly half was from the mines of 
the United States; and that of $90,000,000 worth of 
silver, $70,000,000 was American. In brief, in point 
of enlargement of territory, increase of population, in- 
crease of wealth, growth in all elements of prosperity, 
advance in general intelligence, education, and in all 
that relates to the possession and enjoyment of a high 
Christian civilization, and especially as it relates to the 
enjoyment of civil and religious liberty, and in all that 
betokens the permanency of our republican institutions, 
it is evident that the experiment so boldly attempted 
by our fathers has been more than justified by the his- 
tory of the century. 

If the venerated Washington and his illustrious 
compeers could look upon our land to-day, and behold 
the magnificent and stupendous results of their perilous 
and heroic undertaking, they would say that it far ex- 
ceeded their fondest dreams, and wildest imaginations. 

But I have yet to add another fact, without which 
the full value of this experiment can not be estimated, 
namely : During this hundred years, our republican 
government has undergone very severe strains, and has 
in every instance stood the test successfully. It has 
been tested by wars with other powers. It has been 
tested by a civil war, a war not as cruel, indeed, as 
many, but as stoutly contested, and as bravely fought 
as any in the annals of time, and in which a tremen- 
dous national debt was accumulated, which, without the 
loss of a dollar will be paid. We have not only sur- 
vived the strife, but are rapidly overcoming its bitter- 
ness, and are ready to-day to stand shoulder to shoulder 
in defense of our common country, equally dear to us 
all. It has stood the test of a political contest so close 



1 86 , LESSONS OF A CENTURY, 

and so doubtful, that eight to seven finally decided it ; 
and although many trembled at the possibility, and 
even probability of a violent revolution, the people were 
true to their better instincts, and peace was preserved. 
It has stood another test in the patient endurance of a 
calamity which filled the world with horror, and called 
forth the sympathies of all civilized peoples. And 
although for three months we may be said to have had 
no President, and the absorbing anxiety in all depart- 
ments of the government was such that we might 
almost be said to have had no Cabinet, yet everything 
went on smoothly, and the death of a beloved Presi- 
dent, amid the tears and lamentations of the whole 
land, and the sympathetic sorrow of all nations, did not 
for a moment disturb the safety of the government, or 
interfere with the peaceful accomplishment of its func- 
tions. Even now, when the hideous assassin, with 
Satanic cunning and heartlessness, and matchless im- 
pudence and insolence, is outraging decency, and defy- 
ing all authority on his trial, and humiliating the nation 
by transforming a solemn and dignified trial into a 
disgusting farce, the nation patiently waits for a final 
vindication of justice and the majesty of law, and the 
odious wretch is carefully guarded and protected from 
harm, and freely granted all the advantages that the 
law allows him, to the utmost limit. If he were the 
noblest of men, in place of the fiend he is, or inno- 
cently unfortunate, rather than horribly depraved, he 
could not be more considerately dealt with. 

In presenting so encouraging a view of our progress 
and our present condition, I must not be understood 
to say or to imply that there are no evils to be de- 
precated, and no dangers to be apprehended. There 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 1 8/ 

are evils numerous enough and prevalent enough to 
humble our pride, and there are dangers sufficiently 
threatening to subdue our exultation, and chasten our 
hopes with anxious fears. I can do little more than 
suggest some of these dangers as I hasten on to 
the practical lessons with which I shall close this ad- 
dress. 

1. Our prosperity is a source of danger. Only as 
merciful Heaven shall lovingly chasten us ever and 
anon, can we hope to escape this danger. Such a 
career of almost unbroken prosperity is sure to land us 
in ruin, unless God, in using us to work out his own 
vast designs, shall in his own wise way, afflict us for 
our good. It was the ruin of Sodom that "pride, 
fullness of bread, and abundance of idleness " was in 
her ; and these will be our ruin if we go on increasing 
in wealth, and yielding to its seductions and cor- 
ruptions. It is vastly more difficult to learn '* how to 
abound," than it is to learn how to be abased. 

2. There is danger ahead in the large importations 
of foreigners, and their speedy incorporation into the 
body politic. Many of these immigrants are doubtless 
valuable acquisitions, and contribute effectively to the 
general weal, and are among the most devoted lovers 
of freedom. But hundreds of thousands of them are 
of a different character. Their ignorance, their vices, 
and their false ideas of freedom do not fit them to dis- 
charge the duties of citizenship ; yet they are hardly 
landed until they are invested with all the rights and 
powers of citizenship, and are equals, in their power to 
decide on the gravest and most vital questions that the 
nation is called to decide on, of the wisest and best in 
the land. Ignorance and vice are no bar to citizen- 



1 88 LESSONS OF A CENTURY, 

ship. When you take into consideration the multipli- 
cation and growth of large cities, and reflect that the 
ignorant and vicious congregate in them and become a 
ruling element in politics which can readily be swayed 
by demagogues, and that these great cities largely con- 
trol the politics of states, and even of the nation, it 
will appear that we are not free from danger at this 
point. Do not forget that the most careful esti- 
mates of the vote at the last presidential election give 
about twenty-two per cent, of illiterate voters — nearly 
one-fourth. It is easy to see how such a vote as that, 
swayed by caprice or passion, could overpower all the 
intelligence and virtue of the country. 

3. There is danger in the accumulation of wealth in 
the hands of the few, and of a conflict between labor 
and capital. The rise and rapid growth of monopolies in 
this country, with their necessarily heartless policy, 
and their power to control legislatures and courts and 
the press, and through them the popular elections, 
gives additional emphasis to our fears. It is probable 
that even now the press is subsidized in the interests of 
some of the great monopolies to an extent not gener- 
ally suspected. 

These are not all the dangers that seem to me to 
be ahead of us, but they are sufficient to awaken us to 
vigilance. I do not think these dangers are immedi- 
ately threatening, and I am not without hope that the 
free and healthful development of our institutions will 
fit us to cope successfully with these and other evils 
when we shall be called to face them. But I will say, 
in the language of our lamented Garfield : 

1 ' Our great hope for the future, our great safeguard 
against danger, is to be found in the general and 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. T89 

thorough education of our people, and in the virtue 
which accompanies such education. And all these 
elements depend in a large measure upon the intellec- 
tual and moral culture of the young men who go out 
from our higher institutions of learning. From the 
standpoint of this general culture, we may trustfully 
encounter the perils that assail us. Secure against 
dangers from abroad, united at home by the strongest 
ties of common interest and patriotic pride ; holding 
and unifying our vast territory by the most potent 
forces of civilization; relying upon the intelligent 
strength and responsibility of each citizen, and most of 
all upon the power of truth, without undue arrogance 
we may hope that in the centuries to come our Repub- 
lic will continue to live, and hold its high place among 
the nations, as ' the heir of all the ages, in the fore- 
most files of time. ' " 

And this brings me finally to the lesson to be drawn 
from this survey of a century's progress, of special 
value to the young men of our time. If, as Gen. Gar- 
field said, the elements of safety and prosperity " de- 
pend in large measure upon the intellectual and moral 
culture of the young men who go out from our higher 
institutions of learning," then a heavy responsibility 
rests upon you, young gentlemen, and all genuine 
Cecropians will hold it a first duty to learn how they 
may prepare themselves to perform their part in con- 
serving the interests of freedom, and bearing on to a 
higher perfection the civilization which is their inherit- 
ance. It is difficult to conceive of a higher or more 
responsible task than this to employ the brain and 
heart, the nerve and muscle of young America. I 
must be very brief under this last head, and trust to 



I90 LESSONS OF A CENTURY, 

your intelligence and ready perception to interpret 
aright the hints which I submit. 

I. Lay a broad and deep foundation for your man- 
hood in as broad and thorough an education as possi- 
ble. Do not be in too much of a hurry to assume the 
responsibilities of life. Take plenty of time to prepare 
for your life-work. A liberal education means much 
more now than it ever did. I am not disposed to 
counsel less attention to classical literature and meta- 
physical studies, for I most cordially despise the utili- 
tarian notions of education that have become so popular 
of late years ; but I am sure, in view of the wonderful 
growth of science and art, that you need a great deal 
more instruction in physical science, in political 
economy, and in the history of our own country, her 
constitution, her laws, and the structure of our govern- 
ment, than was formerly deemed necessary, or was 
formerly even possible. Form habits of study that 
will compel you, all your life long, into wider fields of 
thought and investigation than the "pent up Utica" 
of your special calling, whatever that may be, will 
afford. Educated mind rules the world, and always 
will, but it must, for future generations, be the edu- 
cated mind that can unlock the mysteries and the treas- 
ures of heaven and earth, and sea and sky, of mountain 
and valley and plain, of river and lake and ocean, of 
wind and light, of sun and moon, and society and 
government, and of the spiritual as well as the material 
universe. The mere smatterer, though he may succeed 
by trickery for a time, and live by deception a life of 
small success, yet in the long run will be a miserable 
failure, and inherit only contempt and ridicule. He 
may clothe himself in the lion's skin and pass for a lion 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 



I 9 I 



for a little while, but everybody will know him when 
he brays. You will find it true economy of time and 
labor to take all the time and bestow all the labor 
necessary for a thorough preparation for your life 
work. 

2. Have fixed moral and religious principles. With- 
out these you might as well be brutes as men ; for if 
man's superiority is not seen in the supremacy of his 
moral and religious nature, mere intellectual superiority, 
while it may add to his power, can not add to his hap- 
piness. If we must live on the animal plane of life, and 
walk by sense, the more completely animal we are, the 
happier we shall be, and instinct, better than reason, 
would guide us to suitable activities and enjoyments. 

Just here I fear more for the young men of this age 
than at any other point. The rapid and wonderful 
developments of physical science tend to materialism. 
Hence there have sprung up, in connection with them, 
theories and systems which involve a denial of the 
spiritual and the supernatural, and reduce everything 
in the realms of mind, as well as of matter — for in these 
systems mind is matter — to the iron despotism of 
material laws, and hence to the sway of blind neces- 
sity ; and man is but a passive and helpless machine, 
acting only as he is acted on. He is the irresponsible 
product of environments, what we used to call circum- 
stances. His thoughts, his affections, his conscience 
are but evolutions out of material substances under the 
operations of blind and inexorable laws, for which there 
never was a lawgiver, and which assert no sovereignty 
but that of unintelligent force. These audacious theories 
reason God out of the universe, the soul of man out of 
responsibility, and the universe out of all intelligent 



192 LESSONS OF A CENTURY, 

design. They are theories and systems of vast sweep, 
ably advocated and zealously propagated. They lend 
their influence to the literature and science of the age, 
and penetrate all departments of thought and of culture. 
Young men who are eagerly seeking information can 
not escape their influence ; and though they may not be 
absolutely captured, they are puzzled and worried, and 
their faith in revealed religion is disturbed, and often 
paralyzed. They are not able, while pursuing their reg- 
ular studies, to get more than a smattering of these 
modern (and yet most of them quite ancient) specula- 
tions. They catch just enough to unsettle them, and not 
enough to lead to any decided convictions. Hence, they 
start out in life without a positive faith, and with no 
settled principle by which to regulate their lives. A safe 
and prosperous journey, under these circumstances, 
would be a greater miracle than any on, record. " And 
yet there is no necessity for this. Grant that there is 
much that is uncertain in these questions — much that is 
perplexing, much concerning which you have to say, " I 
do not know how to dispose of it ;" still, there is a path 
of perfect safety, which you may travel without closing 
your eyes against any truth, or acting dishonestly with 
any doubts that may arise in your hearts. Among all 
the stupendous facts of history there is one that stands 
forth as the miracle of the ages, Jesus of Nazareth ! 
He belongs to history and to humanity, and the world 
can not get rid of him. Whatever you may think of 
evolution or no evolution, materialism or spiritualism, 
the natural or the supernatural, there stands Jesus. 
After eighteen hundred years of scrutiny, even unbe- 
lievers and skeptics are compelled to say, ' ' I find no 
fault in this man!' His life and doctrine, as tried by 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES, I93 

reason, as tested by the experience of eighteen centu- 
ries, make Him a safe guide ; safe for the individual life, 
safe for the family, safe for the state, safe for all the 
interests of humanity. There is in Him an enlighten- 
ing, regenerating, sanctifying, ennobling power beyond 
anything the world has ever known ; and not only has 
the world's learning and genius failed to improve on 
him, but in their utmost stretches they have failed to. 
exhaust the comprehensiveness of His teaching or the 
beauty and significance of His life and character. In the 
freest and highest assertion of our nationality, therefore, 
we are compelled to say, " Whatever else is false, Christ 
is true ; whatever else may lead into perils, Christ's 
teachings are always safe. T can not make surer work 
than to take Him for my guide, and shape my life ac- 
cording to His counsels. " Why, then, need there be any 
doubt about the principles of your life ? Would you try 
to cross a chasm on a single rope, with millions of 
chances against you, when there is a safe and grand 
highway over which millions have passed in safety, and 
where there is no doubt that you too will be safe? 
Do you dare to believe that in the great battle of 
life you can fight your way without leadership, and 
that through ten thousand snares and witcheries, and 
perils of every kind, you can grope your way in the dark, 
and make sure work of it? No, no ; it is madness, it is 
certain ruin. For perfect safety, for highest moral and 
spiritual attainments, for the achievement of the largest 
possibilities of your nature as regards righteousness, 
goodness and usefulness, for the harmonious develop- 
ment of your whole being and the surest preparation 
for a happy eternity, you need to be a humble, earnest, 
loving disciple of Jesus, 



194 LESSONS OF A CENTURY, 

3. Then, when you have, under Christ, adjusted 
yourself in harmonious relations to God and man, to 
time and eternity, go out under his guidance and do 
whatever your hands find to do for God and humanity. 

" L/et all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country \s, 
Thy God's, and Truth's." 

There is work enough to be done to fill your hearts 
and hands, as long as you have hearts to love what is 
right, and hands to perform the heart's promptings. 
We talk of a Christian civilization, but the world has 
never yet seen a Christian civilization. There is much 
that is barbarous and degrading still lurking in our 
civilization. We need no new Bible, no new religion, no 
new doctrine of human rights ; but we do need a higher 
and wider interpretation, and a juster application of the 
principles of the religion of Jesus, and of the govern- 
ment of the country, than we now see. It is not a new 
material universe that science needs, but a better under- 
standing and interpretation of the universe we have. 
And just so with Christianity. A full understanding 
and faithful application of its divine principles will yet 
revolutionize men's conceptions of right in many par- 
ticulars, as to the social structure, the getting and the 
use of riches, the regulations of commerce, criminal 
jurisprudence, international law, and the aims of indi- 
vidual life. Laws and institutions based on just views 
of men's relations to each other will banish vices, 
crimes, injustices, oppressions, strifes, wars, and a 
thousand evils that now disfigure our best civilization, 
and regenerated humanity, under the benign sway of 
divine philanthropy, will present a sight 
" Such as earth saw never, 
Such as heaven stoops down to see." 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. X95 

That you may bear an honorable part in this on- 
ward march of Christian civilization, and hand over the 
precious heritage which you receive to another genera- 
tion, not only unwasted, but greatly enlarged and en- 
nobled, is, next to the prayer for your eternal welfare, 
the best wish and prayer of my heart for you, young 
gentlemen, and for all the young men of the present 
time. And when the second centennial of the surren- 
der at Yorktown shall come, and heaven shall look 
down upon a population of two hundred millions in 
this fair land of ours, may there be a salutation from the 
hearts of the American people, not only of the British 
flag, but of the flag of every nation under the heavens, 
that shall tell over the round world that wars have ceased, 
that all men are brethren, and that the kingdoms of this 
world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of 
his Christ that he may reign forever and ever. 

It would not do to close this address without the 
beautiful apostrophe of Longfellow, which is indeed, 
in this case, the most fitting peroration : 

"Thou, too, sail on, O Ship of State ! 
Sail on, O Union, strong and great ! 
Humanity, with all its fears, 
With all the hopes of future years, 
Is hanging breathless on thy fate ! 
We know what Master laid thy keel, 
What workmen wrought thy ribs of steel, 
Who made each mast, and sail, and rope, 
In what a forge, and what a heat, 
Were shaped the anchors of thy hope ! 
Fear not each sudden sound and shriek, 
Tis of the wave, and not the rock ; 
'Tis but the flapping of the sail, 
And not a rent made by the gale ! " 



FOREIGN MISSIONS. 

Address by Isaac Errett, President of the Foreign 
Christian Missionary Society, delivered at its 
Anniversary Meeting, in Richmond, Va., October 

i8th, 1876. 

In attempting to address you on the question of 
Foreign Missions, I am aware that my theme is not 
popular. I know that even among the intelligent and 
upright of those who, although not Christians them- 
selves, are, nevertheless, well-wishers to Christianity, a 
large majority are either hostile or indifferent to foreign 
missionary enterprises ; regarding them as chimerical, 
and as involving heavy outlays of money, of labor, and 
even of life, with contemptibly small results. I know, 
too^-and this is more surprising and more discourag- 
ing — that among those who profess to be Christians, 
and notably in our own ranks, it is much the smaller 
number that take any interest in such missions. If the 
majority ever pray, "Thy will be done on earth as it 
is done in heaven;" if they ever ask the Lord to fulfill 
his promise that "the kingdoms of this world shall 
become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ," 
it can not be regarded as an "effectual, fervent prayer," 
for it is not the prayer of faith. They have not the 
least idea that it will ever be, unless they have some 
theory of purely supernatural conversion, through the 

the direct power of Jehovah, without Bible, or preacher, 

196 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. IgJ 

or church ; for they set themselves sternly against every 
effort to supply these means of conversion to the perish- 
ing nations of the earth, absolutely refuse to lift a finger 
towards the answer to their own prayers, and, many of 
them, denounce all such efforts as foolish and vain. I 
deliver this address under the conviction that many — 
perhaps a majority — of those to whom I speak belong 
to this class, and will feel that they are already de- 
scribed in what has been said ; or, if they think my 
picture is an unfaithful one, it is because I have sketched 
them as inconsistent in praying in one direction, and 
looking in another, whereas, in fact, they have not 
faith enough in foreign missions even to pray in their 
behalf. 

You will understand, therefore, that my object is 
to change your convictions on this subject, and enlist 
your sympathies, your prayers, and your labors in this 
direction. Since I first gave this subject a thorough ex- 
amination, some thirty years ago, I have had a profound 
and unfaltering conviction that we, as a people, will 
never reach the culture in faith, in self-denial, and in 
godliness that we need and are capable of, and will 
never occupy the position before the religious world 
which, so far as our principles are concerned, we are 
entitled to occupy, until we give ourselves heartily and 
permanently to missionary work in the broadest sense 
of that phrase ; until our hearts and homes and pulpits 
and pews and presses are all aflame with zeal for the 
spread of the Gospel in all the earth; until "the an- 
cient order of things " is reproduced in that supreme 
consecration to God which not only spends money 
freely, but offers life freely, and welcomes toil, priva- 
tion, persecution, imprisonment, aye, and martyrdom, 



igS FOREIGN MISSIONS, 

if only Christ may be preached and the gates of salva- 
tion be thrown open to all the world. It is in the largest 
view of our future prosperity and usefulness, therefore, 
and not merely with an eye to a transient impression 
or an immediate result, that I now undertake to reason 
with you on this question ; wherefore I beseech you to 
hear me patiently. 

Those whom I would convince are not opposed to 
missions. They are in favor of missions. Nor are they 
opposed to foreign missions as unscriptural, but merely 
as impracticable, or as of inferior importance when 
compared with home missions. " Let us confine our- 
selves," they say, "to home missions, where there is 
enough to be done to enlist all our means and efforts 
in fields that we know will yield a good harvest, until 
our work here is done ; and then we will turn our at- 
tention to some other part of the world." That is, I 
believe, the popular view and the popular cry. That 
has been the cry, largely, among us for the last fifty 
years Now, taking the last fifty years as a basis of 
calculation, and looking at the present condition of our 
home missionary work, will the advocates of that policy 
tell us how many thousands or millions of years must 
elapse before we get through with our home fields, and 
in what future age of the world they expect we shall 
be in readiness to make a beginning in foreign missions? 
It will be much easier, I incline to think, to calculate, 
from our present data, how soon we shall utterly break 
down in our home missions, and demonstrate our utter 
incompetency to establish missions either at home or 
abroad. 

Now, let us understand each other. Let us know 
precisely what the difference is between the advocates 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 1 99 

of home missions, and the advocates of foreign mis- 
sions. I have no wish to make a false issue, and 
certainly time is too precious with me and with you to 
be wasted in the discussion of unreal difficulties. 

First, then, let me say, to guard against mistake, 
there is no difference as to the importance of home 
missions. You are in favor of them; so am I. You 
desire to raise money to support them ; so do I. You 
are not willing that any money which can be obtained 
for home fields should be diverted to the support of 
missions or missionary experiments in foreign fields ; 
neither am I. I would much rather increase the amount 
a thousand fold for home missions, than to diminish it 
to the extent of a single dollar ; nor would I willingly 
or knowingly persuade any one to take a dollar which 
he meant to give to home missions and devote it to 
foreign missions. So far we are agreed. 

Nor, secondly, is our difference about the obligation 
resting on the Church to use her full power to disciple 
the nations. I insist on this as true, and none of you, 
I presume to say, will dispute it. Where, then, is the 
difference ? 

Just here — as to the best way to accomplish this 
result. 

You say: For the present, it is wisdom to con- 
fine ourselves to the home field. We need all the 
money and all the preachers we have, at home. We 
can do more with them here than can be done in any 
part of the world. We must economize our forces. 
Anxious as we are to have the Gospel preached in all 
the world, to every creature, we are not able to do that 
all at once. Let us do, for the present, all we can at 
home ; and trust in God for such growth and increase 



200 FOREIGN MISSIONS, 

of strength as will enable us, at some future time, to 
enlarge the area of our operations. 

The advocates of foreign missions say : Not so : let 
us indeed carry on our home work. Let not that fail. 
But let us, at the same time, reach out to other parts 
of the earth, wherever God opens a door, and carry on 
the work both at home and abroad. 

That is just the difference. It is not a difference of 
faith, not a difference as to doing all in our power to 
turn men to God ; but it is a difference of opinion, of 
judgment, as to the wisest methods of working to this 
end. It is one of those differences which may exist 
without any disloyalty to Christ, and which should not, 
therefore, disturb the fellowship of Christians. But 
it is a difference which may be soberly and kindly dis- 
cussed, with a view to overcoming it ; for, certainly, it 
is desirable, even in matters of judgment, that we be, 
if possible, of one mind. 

Now, I am willing to admit that the argument in favor 
of confining ourselves exclusively to home missions, is 
plausible and forcible, and has a good deal of truth in 
it. Those who employ it are not simpletons, neither are 
they dishonest. They have an honest conviction that 
they are right ; and because of this conviction they 
look either with indifference or with jealousy on at- 
tempts to establish foreign missions, as likely to draw 
away, into doubtful enterprises, money and men that 
could be much more profitably employed at home. But 
while I admit the plausibility of the argument, and have 
no desire to diminish the force of any truth it contains, 
I am thoroughly satisfied that, as it is presented and 
urged, it is delusive and mischievous. For, mark you, 
it is not that, in view of the facts they state, it is best 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 201 

to employ tlie larger portion of our means at home, and 
only a small portion in less accessible and much less 
promising fields. All that might, for the present, be 
granted. But it is that these facts warrant us in keep- 
ing all our means at home, and closing our eyes and 
ears against all appeals from a perishing world, and 
against all opportunities, however inviting, that Provi- 
dence may point out to us, outside of our own terri- 
tory. Against this we protest. We say it is an 
unauthorized conclusion, and that the arguments 
brought to support it are unsound. This we now pro- 
pose to show, and in showing it we desire to make as 
fair and strong a statement of the arguments used in 
behalf of exclusively home missions as if we were 
ourselves advocating that view. 

I. One of the most recent arguments in behalf of 
that position is that the Scriptures make no distinction 
between home and foreign missions ; it is simply mis- 
sions, without regard to this land or that ; and if we are 
carrying on missions anywhere, we are fulfilling the 
commission given to the apostles. 

Now, my brethren, if this be so; if the Scriptures 
make no distinction between home and foreign mis- 
sions, then home and foreign missions stand on a pre- 
cisely equal footing. Is it not passing strange, then, 
that those who make this statement should make it for 
the sole purpose of making a distinction which the 
Scriptures do not make? It is made in opposition to 
foreign missions. The argument is this : The Scrip- 
tures make no distinction of missions into home and 
foreign ; therefore let us make a distinction, and have 
nothing but home missions. As well say, The Gospel 
makes no distinction between rich and poor ; therefore 



202 FOREIGN MISSIONS. 

let us attend exclusively to the rich, and object to all 
labors in behalf of the poor. Do you perceive any- 
thing convincing in that ? It might do for us, as the 
advocates of both home and foreign missions, to em- 
ploy such an argument, for we really have no need for 
the distinction. We go in for missions, whether home 
or foreign. But to oppose foreign missions, and advo- 
cate home missions, on the ground that the Bible 
knows no distinction between home and foreign, is a 
downright absurdity, as every one must see at a glance. 
But I have no desire to take advantage of a false 
position. My position needs no such help. The state- 
ment lacks correctness. The Scriptures do make a dis- 
tinction between home and foreign missions. They do 
not use these zvords, but they describe these things ; and 
they stand out in bold contrast. The Jews had mis- 
sions, but they were home missions. At different 
times prophets and priests were sent out to instruct the 
people and recover them from their apostasies. But 
they were sent only to the tribes of their own land. 
They had no missions to other nations. Even when 
sent into captivity, or when settling in any of the great 
marts of commerce, they were never instructed to 
make proselytes. They were to seek the peace of the 
city or the country in which they dwelt, and if any from 
another nation wished to be incorporated with them, 
they were to receive him ; but beyond this they were 
not authorized to go. This was the exclusive home 
missionary spirit in its perfection. For Jewish pur- 
poses it was a wise and righteous arrangement ; and if 
we are Jews, or have a mission similar to theirs, it may 
be the best arrangement still. But we submit that it is 
not Christian. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 20$ 

Our Saviour started two great missions in subordi- 
nation to his own. These were all home missions. " I 
am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Is- 
rael." "Go not into the way of the Samaritans, and 
into any city of the Gentiles enter ye not ; but go rath- 
er to the lost sheep of the house of Israel." These are 
clearly and exclusively home missions. They were 
right. And if we have not got further along than this 
in Scriptural knowledge and development, it may be 
wise to stay within the limits of our own land until we 
obtain a higher education in the gracious purposes of 
Messiah's reign. But when we pass the law and the 
personal ministry of Jesus, and come, by the way of 
the cross and the forsaken sepulcher, to the announce- 
ment of the grand purpose of the new dispensation, it 
is no longer home, but foreign missions. " Go, disci- 
ple the nations.'' " Go ye into all the world" and 
preach the Gospel to every creature" Is not that for- 
eign missions? The home missions of His personal 
ministry were preparatory, and lasted but a year or 
two ; but these foreign missions are to continue always, 
even unto the end of the world. There is, then, a dis- 
tinction between home and foreign missions: the home 
missions were introductory, preparatory, transient ; the 
foreign missions are the permanent order of the king- 
dom of Christ. It is neither come, nor stay where you 
are ; but go ; and go into all the world. 

"But even here," you are ready to say, "home is 
not ignored ; for home is in the world, and our Ameri- 
can home is a very considerable part of the world ; and 
our first duty is at home. " Very true. All the world 
can not be reached at once ; and there must be order 
and wisdom in our goings forth. Hence our Lord, 



204 FOREIGN MISSIONS. 

with perfect wisdom, said : " Ye shall be witnesses un- 
to me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, 
and unto the uttermost part of. the earth." And Paul 
says: "To the Jew first, and also to the Greek." So 
that even in the Gospel we have home and foreign mis- 
sions. There is a distinction, and that distinction gives 
the preference to home missions. "Unto you first, 
God having raised up his Son Jesus, hath sent him to 
bless you, in turning every one of you from his iniqui- 
ties. " There is the strongest common sense in this. 
Do the thing that is next to you. Begin at home. 
Your first duty is there. But, mark you, while the first 
duty is there, the last duty is not there. Begin at Jeru- 
salem, but pause not until you have reached the "utter- 
most part of the earth." I think the early converts to 
Christ, with all their zeal and benevolence, did not 
realize this. They acted as if their first and last duty 
was at home. Jerusalem was all in all to them. Years 
passed without an effort being made outside of that 
city. No mission was undertaken even in behalf of 
the places to which many of the Pentecostian converts 
must have returned. But while they thus lingered at 
home, God let loose a bloody persecution upon them. 
Saul of Tarsus, even before his conversion, was the 
first man to start Gospel missions ; for, by reason of the 
persecution which he headed the disciples were all 
scattered abroad throughout the regions of Judea and 
Samaria, and ' ' they that were scattered abroad went 
everywhere preaching the Word." They reached even 
unto Phoenicia, and Cyprus, and the great city of An- 
tioch, before they were done. So you see they were 
not allowed to stay at home. If they would not go, 
they were driven. And if we attempt to shut our- 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 20} 

selves up within the limits of our Jerusalem, and to 
content ourselves with our home work, the Lord, if 
he loves'us, and means to use us, will find means to 
scatter us and compel us into the performance of our 
duty. He will make us know that there is a difference 
between staying at home and going unto the uttermost 
part of the earth. 

II. But it is urged, in the second place, that our 
ability is the measure of our accountability, and that as 
we have not the ability to carry the Gospel into all the 
world, we are hot accountable for the failure to do so. 
In other words, we have all we can possibly do in our 
own land ; and we are not really furthering the interests 
of the Gospel by withdrawing our means from this really 
needy field, where the yield is certain, and sending 
them to foreign fields, where the results are altogether 
uncertain We need all our money here, and all our 
men here. One dollar will yield more here than per- 
haps a hundred in a foreign field, and a preacher may 
make more converts here in a year than in a foreign 
field in a life-time. 

I put this in as strong a light as I think any of you 
would put it. I am frank to say that it has great ap- 
parent force ; yet I think I can convince you that it is 
altogether too unguarded a statement. I venture now 
the prediction that none of you will be willing, after 
ten minutes, to be responsible for its legitimate con- 
clusions. For what is true of this whole nation is 
true also of every state in the nation. There is not a 
state in this Union in which the Disciples may not say, 
with equal truth : ' * We have need of all our men and 
money at home. Our ability is the measure of our 
accountability. Our first duty is at home. When our 



206 FOREIGN MISSIONS. 

state is filled with churches, and our work here is done, 
then we may make a beginning abroad." And what 
is true of every state is true of every district.' So the 
states will not help in any national work, and the dis- 
tricts will not help in any state work. Then, again, 
what is true of any district is true of every church in 
the district. Who knows of a church that can not 
find employment for all its money at home? So the 
districts will get no help. Our strongest churches 
find so much for their preachers to do that they can 
not spare them, even for a few weeks, to a needy neigh- 
borhood, and so much trouble to raise money for their 
home work that they excuse themselves from doing 
anything for other fields. That is not all. What every 
church says, every member of the church can say : 
1 ' I have my own family to provide for. My first duty 
is at home. My family can spend money as fast as I 
can make it. When I spend money in my own family, 
I know where it goes. I have no right to take the 
money that my family needs, and give it where it may 
be wasted on some lazy or incompetent preacher, and 
do no good. Charity begins at home." And so the 
church gets nothing! I have not carried this to the 
last analysis, but I have taken it far enough. It will 
not do. There is something wrong about it. There 
is a screw loose somewhere. Such reasoning, faithfully 
followed out, would kill all home missions as well as all 
foreign missions. Indeed, it has already killed most 
of them, and it is high time we had our eyes opened 
to detect the fallaciousness and mischievousness of such 
reasoning. 

Where, then, you ask, is the fallacy? Let us see 
if we can detect it. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 2C>7 

Let us begin where we left off, and reason back- 
ward. 

Here is a Christian family. Do I deny, you ask, 
that the first duty of a family is to its own members? 
No ; but I deny that it exhausts its duty in providing 
for its own members. Is it not true, you ask, that 
many families are unable to do more than provide for 
themselves — unable to do even that properly ? Yes, 
that is true in some cases, but it is not generally true. 
It is not true of the average family. Most families, in 
addition to providing for their own, are able to do 
something to help others not as well off as they are. 
And — let this be especially marked — if they will not 
do it, if they shrivel into such selfishness as to excuse 
themselves from all kindness to others, a withering 
curse will come into their own bosom, and their own 
capacity for happiness and for genuine family life will, 
in the end, be lost. 

So with a church. There are churches that can not 
do more than provide for themselves, and some that can 
not do even that, and need to be helped. But this is 
not true of the average church. Most churches are 
able, by proper self-denial, to do something— it may 
not be very much — to help weaker churches and to 
help the world. If they fail to do it, they cripple the 
very powers on which their home prosperity depends, 
and soon they will not give even for themselves. In 
giving they increase the power to give, and call down 
the blessing which Heaven is more than willing to be- 
stow on the liberal giver, and they will do even more 
at home than they would otherwise have done. 

So of the district and the state. There are weak 
districts and weak states. But others are strong. 



208 FOREIGN MISSIONS, 

And if the weak struggle to help themselves, and the 
strong go up to their help, with the effort to do and to 
givG comes increased power to do and to give ; and if 
they fail to do and to give, the very power to do and 
to give diminishes, and they are soon dwarfed into 
insignificance or shriveled into nothingness. We have 
had some states that tried this. One year ago one of 
our western states withdrew from all participation in 
our general work, and resolved to devote itself entirely 
to home work ; and God sent such leanness into their 
ranks, and the experiment was so ghastly in its results 
— less than $1,000 being raised for their home work — 
that they wisely took the alarm, and resolved on 
amendment. The same thing is practically true in most 
of our states and districts. We are poorer in faith, 
poorer in our treasures, and weaker in our power to 
give, even for our home work, just in proportion as we 
have quenched the spirit of giving by listening to this 
unchristian and selfish plea in behalf of home. 

And what is true of the family, the church, the dis- 
trict, and the state, is true of the nation. It is not true 
that we are unable to do anything outside of our own 
land. It is true that we need the larger part of our means 
at home. But we are also able to do something for 
other lands ; and as to needs, they are everywhere^ 
and much greater abroad than at home. It is 
not true that if we do nothing abroad we shall 
do more at home. On the contrary, it is certain 
that we will do less at home ; for, in refusing to do any 
thing abroad, we dwarf our sympathies, we blunt our 
consciences, we paralyze our faith, we smother our 
heroism, we enervate our philanthropic impulses, we 
gratify our selfishness ; and we have less faith, less 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 200, 

sympathy, less conscience, less heroism, less benevo 
lence, to draw upon for the home work. We bring to 
it a weakened moral nature, and a strengthened selfish- 
ness, and the home yield is lessened. Forever and 
ever it is true that ''there is that scattereth and yet in- 
creaseth; and there is that withholdeth more than is 
meet, and it tendeth to poverty." 

This is not mere theory. It is supported by the 
plainest and most abundant facts. It amounts to dem- 
onstration. Not to go out of our own country, let us 
call your attention for a moment to facts here which 
are beyond dispute. When Judson's conversion to 
Baptist principles roused the Baptists of this country 
to give for missions in India, did it take away from 
their means for home missions? On the contrary, 
pretty much all their organized home mission work has 
grown out of and been fed by their interest in foreign 
missions. 

Here is an extract from a letter recently received 
from a Baptist who is a member of this Society. In 
remitting his annual subscription, he says: 

" Herein please find $20, and credit it as first install- 
ment of my pledge. I am a member of the Baptist Church t 
and for many years have co-operated with them in foreign 
mission work, and can not doubt that the prosperity which 
the Baptist Church has enjoyed may be traced to the bless- 
ing of God, in fulfillment of His promises, on account of 
their noble, persistent, and successful efforts, from the days 
of Judson until now, to extend the glad tidings, in accordance 
with the last command of our Lord, ' Go ye into all the 
world, and proclaim the glad message to every creature.' 
And although this message is delivered by them less clearly 
than the Disciples would announce it, and its glory is ob- 
scured by mystery and error, their zeal is worthy of imitation 



210 FOREIGN MISSIONS, 

by the Disciples of Christ. I believe the blessing of God 
must be withheld from the Christian Church so long as it 
is characterized by a selfishness that withholds the means 
necessary to extend the knowledge of God to every creature ; 
and will be given a large measure when, with heart and soul, 
it shall engage in this work. 'Daily' will they 'praise the 
Lord,' and ' continually offer ' acceptable ' prayer to him,' 
who first with willing hearts give to him 'the gold of Sheba.' 
(Psalm lxxii. 15). That your annual meeting at Richmond 
will fully enlist the hearts of the brotherhood in this great 
work, is my earnest desire and prayer to God ; assured as I 
am of the blessing of God upon the handful of corn they 
shall plant upon the tops of the mountains. « The fruit 
thereof shall shake like Lebanon.' Then 'they of the city 
shall flourish like the grass of the earth ;' because the Lord 
hears their prayers, and their alms have gone up as a me- 
morial before Him. Then, too, ' men shall be blessed in 
Christ, and ail nations shall call Him blessed.'" 

And in perfect harmony with this is the language 
of a recent editorial in the Watchman, a Baptist paper 
published in Boston : 

" But no one will question that our foreign missions should 
occupy the first and largest place in our benevolence. It 
was in prosecuting them that we gained grace to work more 
earnest^ for lost souls in our own land. To our labors in 
India we owe much of our enlargement in America. That 
which was first in the order of our growth, should be first 
in our sjrnipathies and toils. It still holds its supremacy of 
influence : as we give for the conversion of the heathen, so 
shall we gain spiritual and temporal gifts for our hearts, our 
homes, our churches." 

And among the Congregationalists and Presbyter- 
ians, what was their home mission work previous to 
the time that Samuel John Mills, Gordon Hall and 
James Richards met at that haystack on the bank of 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 211 

the Hoosac River, and gave themselves to God and to 
each other, and formed a society "to effect, in the 
persons of its members, a mission or missions to the 
heathen " ? Out of that arose the American Board of 
Commissioners for Foreign Missions, the American 
Bible Society, the United Foreign Missionary Society, 
and the African School, under the care of the Synod 
of New York and New Jersey; and, indirectly, the 
American Baptist Board of Foreign Missions ; and in 
the wake of these pretty much all of their home mis- 
sion work has been accomplished. Scarcely any thing 
worth mentioning had been done in home missions, 
until they enlisted in foreign missions. 

And in our own history, do we not see the same 
thing illustrated ? Until our missions in Jerusalem and 
in the island of Jamaica were undertaken, nothing had 
been done worthy of mention in organized home mis- 
sion work ; but along with these missions we carried 
on the home mission work successfully. We never 
did as much to plant the Gospel in destitute home 
regions as during the years that we sustained those 
foreign missions. This I have abundant reason to 
know, for I was then, for several years, in the service 
of the General Missionary Society, and knew all about 
its affairs. The records show that these years were 
years of unparalleled success in raising money, and of 
unparalleled prosperity in home mission work. In an 
evil hour, under the pressure of adversities to which 
our faith was not equal, we abandoned our foreign mis- 
sions, and from that day to this we have been smitten 
with confusion and cursed with barrenness in our home 
work. All our painstaking, laborious efforts to unite 
our brethren in any scheme for the evangelization of 



212 FOREIGN MISSIONS, 

our home fields have been confounded. I do not mean 
that nothing has been done, but that nothing has been 
done to fulfill the promise of those years in which we 
were stretching out our hands to the needy of other 
lands. Some of the strongest states report less than 
$1,000 collected this last year for missionary work in 
their own borders — and these are the very states in 
which have been heard the loudest complaints about 
the folly of wasting money in foreign missions that is 
so much needed at home ! I have no reason to believe 
that God will ever lift the curse away from us that has 
brought blight and desolation everywhere to our mis- 
sionary enterprises, until we repent of our folly and 
begin anew to act a part worthy of us under the broad 
commission, ' ' Go ye into all the world, and preach the 
Gospel to every creature." As a friend of home mis- 
sions, therefore, anxious to remove the obstacles to 
their success, I am the earnest advocate of foreign 
missions. 

III. In the third place, it is argued that the expen- 
diture in men, in time, and in money, in foreign mis- 
sions, is out of all proportion to the results. The small 
success does not warrant the great outlay. 

We answer : 

i. If this argument is worth anything to-day, it will 
be worth as much always and evermore ; for whenever 
a beginning is made, the work of the first years must 
be expensive and comparatively barren of results. It is 
equivalent, therefore, to saying that it shall never be at- 
tempted. Either this, or you must imagine that God 
has reserved some special method of converting the 
heathen, without the preaching of the Gospel — like 
the venerable Dr. Ryland, when Wm. Carey proposed, 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 213 

at a ministers' meeting, as a topic of discussion, the 
duty of Christians to attempt the spread of the Gospel 
in foreign lands. "Sit down, young man," said Dr. 
Ryland, indignantly, ' ' sit down ; when it pleases God 
to convert the heathen, He will do it without your aid 
or mine." That could hardly be called inconsistent, in 
view of the theory of regeneration and conversion then 
prevalent ; but it would be a monstrous absurdity if 
uttered to-day by any man who professes to believe 
that " faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the 
Word of God." We do not wish to conceal the fact 
that, for a time, there may be much toil, and outlay of 
money and time, with but little apparent result. On 
the contrary, we desire to emphasize it. We do not 
seek to gather into this Society any who are not willing 
to labor and to wait. This work of faith and patience 
must be undertaken sometime by somebody, or the work 
will never be done. We ask you to pause long before 
you commit yourselves to a position which practically 
surrenders as hopeless, for all time, the fulfillment of 
the commission. 

2. Let us say that this may be the very thing we 
need. The trial of our faith in this very way may be 
the very best success for us ; for it is much more pre- 
cious than gold that perisheth ; and if only it is found 
"unto praise and honor and glory at the appearing of 
Jesus Christ," what we have paid or suffered will not 
have been an useless expenditure. It may be that we 
shall spend thousands of dollars with no apparent 
result ; that lives will be sacrificed in the effort ; and 
that many years will come and go which shall only be 
years of tearful seed-sowing without so much as a 
sprout to tell of answering life or coming harvest. 



214 FOREIGN MISSIONS, 

But that is not our concern. If it is duty to "go 
into all the world and preach the Gospel to every 
creature," then let duty be done, and let God take 
care of the consequences. If God bids me go and 
quarry in flinty rocks that defy the hardest steel, it is 
nothing to me if I can do no more than dull my drill 
and sharpen it again. I must sharpen and drill and 
dull, and sharpen and drill and dull, if I can do no 
more. And when He comes who sent me there, if I 
can do no more, I will answer His flash of fire from the 
skies with a shower of sparks from the stubborn rock 
which I smite in His name, and He shall find me peck- 
ing away, even if there be no result — because He told me 
to. The rock may not be the worse for it, but my 
heart will be the better for it. If the rock has not 
yielded, my soul has grown stronger, and has risen 
into a stateliness and might that only come as the 
reward of faith clinging to duty for duty's sake. And 
when I shall show Him my battered pick and broken 
drill, and stand before Him, covered with the sweat of 
my unyielding toil, and only those broken and battered 
tools as the fruit of my labor, I shall expect to 
hear Him say, "Well done." But if He come not, I 
must work away. 

I believe that what we need, above all things else, 
is an infusion of the heroic element into our faith — a 
heroism that laughs at impossibilities, and balks not 
when asked to remove mountains. We have reasoners, 
exhorters, debaters, planners, critics, scribes — and per- 
haps Pharisees — in plenty ; now we want heroes and 
heroines ! A few martyrs for Christ's sake, would be 
worth more to us than thousands of gold and silver. 
If, on coming here, we had received letters from 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 215 

brethren and sisters pining in dungeons for the truth's 
sake, and messages sent to us from the blistered lips 
of martyrs suffering in the flames for the dear love of 
Christ, it would do more to rouse us to enthusiasm and 
bring us nearer to the heart of God and consecrate us 
anew to his service, than the tidings of a thousand 
victories on easy fields, won almost without cost. Our 
faith is too soft, too effeminate. The cross is on our 
lips, in our songs and sermons, but not on our 
shoulders. We are sound and respectable and intelli- 
gent and dignified and polished, and all that, but we 
are not heroic. We are scared at the very shadow of 
the cross. We dare not, like Abraham, go out at the 
voice of God, not knowing whither we go — content 
that God shall lead us. We hug the shore in our 
sailings, and tremble to get out of sight of land, no 
difference how many stars of promise hang over us, or 
how steadily the polar star gives forth its light, or how 
many voices of Providence come on the breezes to telL 
us of bright lands of promise far away. If we send 
out spies, they can only tell, when they return, of the 
giants, the sons of Anak, and the walled cities, and 
say, ' ' We be not able to go up against the people, 
for they are stronger than we." And if here and 
there the form of a Caleb or a Joshua is seen, holding 
up the mighty clusters of the grapes of Eshcol, and 
testifying, "Let us go up at once and possess the 
land, for we are well able to overcome it," we proceed 
at once to pelt them with derisions and drive them 
from the camp. If I were asked what, above all other 
things, we need to pray for, in view of our present 
circumstances, needs and perils, I would say, "Let us 
pray God to give us a few heroes — men like Judson, 



2l6 FOREIGN MISSIONS, 

who will go forth and welcome toil and suffering, and 
apparently fruitless labor, for the sake of Christ." It 
was six years before Judson was cheered with a single 
convert. After he had been three years at Rangoon, 
he wrote thus : 

" If any ask what success I met with among the natives, 
tell them to look at Otaheite, where the missionaries labored 
nearly twenty years, and, not meeting with the slightest 
success, began to be neglected by all the Christian world, 
and the very name of Otaheite was considered a shame to 
the cause of missions ; but now the blessing begins to de- 
scend. Tell them to look at Bengal, also, where Dr. 
Thomas had been laboring seventeen years, that is, from 
1783 to 1800, before the first convert, Krishno, was baptized. 
. . . If we live some twentj' or thirty years, they may 
hear from us again." 

And they did hear from him again — glorious man ! 
Look at the Baptist missions to-day in the East, and 
behold the glorious rewards of heroic faith. There 
are now sixty thousand Christians as the fruit of the 
work begun in Burmah by Judson. 

Have we said enough in reply to this argument ! 
We can best embody our own view of this feature 
of the question in another statement concerning Jud- 
son. When compiling a dictionary, and performing 
an arduous work in which he seemed to be continually 
putting forth his hands into the dark, he wrote on the 
cover of a book he was using : 

" In joy or sorrow, health or pain, 
Our course be onward still ; 
We sow on Burmah's barren plain, 
We reap on Zion's hill" 

3. But, in the third place, we deny that the results 
of modern missionary effort have been so unfruitful or 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 2\>] 

so unpromising as is generally represented. Modern 
missions are only about seventy-five years old. Only 
two Protestent missionary societies existed in 1790 — 
the Moravian, and that for the propagation of the 
gospel in foreign parts. In 1796, when two overtures 
in behalf of foreign missions were laid before the 
General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, the 
scheme was denounced as "highly dangerous to 
society," and it was held to be " improper and absurd 
to propagate the gospel abroad while there remained a 
single individual at home without the necessary re- 
ligious knowledge." We have already referred to 
William Carey, and the treatment of his proposition 
by Dr. Ryland. From only one minister in London — 
the good John Newton — did Carey at first receive any 
sympathy. Such was the unpromising beginning some 
eighty years ago. Of course, outside the Church the 
opposition was still more pronounced. We can not 
take time or space for a detailed statement of results, 
but we will give enough to show that the work has 
been anything but a failure. 

Where Judson began to sow on " Burmah's barren 
plains," there are now, as already stated, sixty thou- 
sand Christians, and a host of faithful native workers. 
In Madagascar, where the first effort was made a little 
over fifty years ago, the London Missionary Society 
now reports 64,896 church members. There are 
other missions there. Here are the missionary statis- 
tics of India : 

Population of India, according to last census, 300,000,000 

Languages spoken, 23 

Missionary societies at work, ... 35 

Missionaries employed, 600 



2l8 FOREIGN MISSIONS, 

Native ordained preachers, .... 381 

Native day preachers, 2,528 

Native pupils in school, .... 143,192 

Of these, girls and } T oung women, . . . 26,611 

Female missionary societies at work, . . 4 

Mission presses, 25 

Bible societies, ....... 8 

Tract societies, 11 

Native christian communicants, . . . 85,000 

Native christian population, .... 330,000 
Increase in ten years, sixty-one per cent. 

At this rate the Protestant native Christian popula- 
tion of India, in one hundred and thirty years, will be 
one hundred and thirty-eight millions ! 

From a recent book, called " A Survey of Mission 
Work," we submit the following summary of the 
present status of foreign missionary work : 

" Grouping together the figures, we have the following 
approximation to the present membership in the Mission 
Churches as collected from different sources, and it is in no 
way an overstatement : 

Africa, including Madagascar, .... .130,000 

Europe, including Scandinavia and Germany, . 53.500 

Asia, 120,000 

Polynesia, 70,000 

America, North and South, 21 500 

West Indies, 105,000 

Total, 500,000 

" The number of ordained missionaries in connection 
with these various missionary organizations is about 2,300; 
m 1825, the true number was not over 400. The greatest 
increase has been in native laborers , but as there is no 
uniformity among the societies in classifying the different 
workers, whether ordained or simply catechists or helpers, 
it would be difficult to give a fair exhibit of the ordained 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 2IO, 

preachers. The membership has gone up from 40,000 to 
500,000 in fifty years. There is also a difficulty in stating 
positively the exact sum expended on missionary work. 
Thus the Wesleyans of England and the Propagation So- 
ciety received last year $1,570,000, but a large amount of 
this was spent on colonial work in Europe, Australia, 
Canada, Cape of Good Hope, etc. The average for the last 
few years of the missionary societies — British, Continental 
and American — may be set down at $6,000,000. This is a 
great advance in the last fifteen years ; showing that the 
work is taking a deeper hold upon the hearts of God's 
children." 

When the young men at William's College first 
formed a society for foreign missions among them- 
selves, they adopted as one of tne articles of their 
organization, that * ' the existence of this society shall 
be kept secret " — such was their fear of opposition. 
Now, in the lands outside of Christendom, there are 
four thousand centers of Christian instruction ; over 
two thousand five hundred congregations have been 
organized ; there is a membership of five hundred 
thousand ; and populations adopting the Christian 
name, as in opposition to other religions, aggregating 
about 1,500,000 people. 

We have said nothing about the services rendered 
to civilization by missionaries outside their immediate 
work of preaching the gospel — in literature and in 
science, in opening up unknown countries to the civi- 
lized world, and in various ways which we can not 
now detail. One such life as that of Livingstone, in 
its bearings on the interests of philanthropy, of 
science and of Christian civilization, is too mighty to 
be estimated by any human standards. He was a 
missionary ; his strange work was all done in the mis- 



220 FOREIGN MISSIONS, 

sionary spirit, and he died on his knees, in prayer ! 
Contrast his peaceful, Christian work with the worldly- 
wise mission of Stanley, carrying death and destruction 
with him wherever he goes, and you will be able to 
form some idea of the value of genuine missionary 
services to the cause of humanity. The work of such 
men as Carey and Judson and Morrison and Living- 
stone, measured even by worldly standards, has been 
of incalculable value to the interests of the human race. 
Let us add, that the gates of the world are now 
thrown open as never before to missionary enterprise. 
Mexico is surely working her way out from under 
priestly domination, and opens a vast field to mission- 
ary effort. In South America the same result is 
gradually being brought about. Japan has already 
adopted Sunday as the national day of rest, and her 
own statesmen, as the result of contact with Christian 
civilization, are beginning to express the judgment 
that theirs must, in the end, be a Christian nation. 
Her converts to Christianity are from the intelligent 
and influential classes. China gives us access, by one 
language, to some four hundred millions of the human 
race, who will be found accessible sooner than we will 
be ready to meet their wants. Already there are ten 
thousand converts in the Protestant missions. Italy, 
so long the center of an accursed despotism, is free to 
the gospel now. Germany, long since weary of her 
state religion, and disgusted with its irrational formal- 
ism and arbitrary requirements, having vainly sought 
relief in Rationalism, is in a better mood than ever 
before to appreciate a pure gospel. Denmark, in her 
popular agitations concerning Church and State, is 
ready to question the politico-ecclesiastical source of 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 221 

her religious faith and practice. In Southern India 
che Protestant missions are, in the judgment of un- 
prejudiced observers, ' ' silently revolutionizing the life 
of the nation," and the prospects of success in this 
work are continually brightening. 

Surely, in view of past achievements, and present 
opportunities, even the weak in faith may be em- 
boldened to enter on this work and prosecute it 
vigorously. Look at it. In addition to all we have 
stated of the success of the last seventy-five years, 
let it be remembered that within the same period 
Bible societies have issued one hundred and thirty-five 
million copies of the Scriptures, in most of the 
languages spoken among men. There are now some 
two hundred and seventy -five versions of the Scrip- 
tures. It is estimated that at the end of the first 
century there were not half as many Christians on the 
globe as are found to-day in India, from less than one 
hundred years of effort. In Madagascar alone, a 
nation of five millions of people, it is claimed that 
there has been wrought, within fifty years, as complete 
a revolution as was found in the Roman empire down 
to the days of Constantine. 

Sandwich Islanders and South Sea Islanders, fifty 
years ago savages and cannibals, now have homes and 
schools and laws. 

Seventy years ago there was not a solitary native 
Christian in Polynesia ; now, it would be difficult to 
find a professed idolater in Eastern or Central Polynesia. 
They present a very fair and encouraging form of 
Christian civilization. 

Is it worth while any longer to stand in paralyzing 
doubt and ask, " Can these dead bones live?" 



222 FOREIGN MISSIONS, 

Impressed with such considerations as we havt no>» 
submitted to you, a number of us have organize*} a 
Foreign Christian Missionary Society. We did this, 
not because of any opposition to the General Conven- 
tion, but because we had grown weary waiting for the 
Convention to undertake this work, and hopeless of 
even the possibility of such work being undertaken by 
the Convention, under its present plan of operations, 
for many years to come. 

We, therefore, proposed a voluntary association of 
such Christians as are in favor of foreign missions, and 
are willing to pay for their support, to operate in fel- 
lowship with the General Convention, the latter work- 
ing in the home field while we go abroad to foreign 
fields. We propose no controversy with any as to 
plans and methods. Those who can not work with us 
are at liberty to stay out, and work in their own way. 
We believed that a sufficient number would be found 
to agree to work in this way to give assurance of at 
least moderate success, and, with faith in God, we 
have humbly sought to lay the foundations of an 
enterprise which we trust will grow into goodly pro- 
portions. The result of the first year's operations was 
laid before you this afternoon. It is a small begining, 
but it is a good one. We undertook the work at a 
time when the business of the country was pros. 
trate, and our first year's contributions have been 
gathered in the very face of business disaster and 
wreck, when it seemed almost heartless to ask men 
for money. Moreover, we have made but little special 
effort outside of a small circle. Having under such 
circumstances been able to make as encouraging a 
report as you heard to-day, we, of course, expect, 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 223 

with better times and greater effort, to increase and 
abound in means, in labors, and in results. We show 
you our " handful of corn" which we have planted in 
faith ; we expect that the fruit thereof shall * ' shake 
like Lebanon." We ask all who share with us in 
these convictions, and are willing to participate in this 
work, to come into our Society, and unite their means, 
their labors and their prayers with ours. We ask. 
none others. We are weary of discussion, and want 
to see something done in which all good hearts can 
rejoice ; and all hearty doers and goers will find a hearty 
welcome. 

Let me, in conclusion, call your attention to a fact 
which studious men have noted, and which Christians 
ought all to understand. The leading religions of the 
world, apart from Christianity, are ethnic, that is, 
they are religions of races or nations. Brahminism 
for more than three thousand years has been confined 
to that section of the Aryan family that has inhabited 
India. The doctrine of Confucius has been confined 
to the Chinese ; that of Zoroaster, to Persia. Al- 
though they conquered many nations, they never com- 
municated their religion. So of the religions of 
Egypt, of Greece, of Scandinavia, of Judea, and even 
in a good degree of Mohammedanism and of Buddhism. 
Mohammedanism has been propagated by the sword ; 
but even this spirit of proselytism comes to it through 
its connection with the religion of the Bible, for it is 
an offshoot of Bible religion. 

Christianity is the religion of the race. It appeals 
to humanity, it is adapted to humanity, its fundamental 
ideas and principles are such that it has no worthy 
meaning short of the redemption of humanity ; and it 



224 FOREIGN MISSIONS, 

can not be justly handled by any people who are inca- 
pable of appreciating its divine adaptedness to human 
nature wherever found, or unwilling to act in the 
spirit of its world-wide philanthropy. We shall best 
vindicate its claims to a divine origin by acting in har- 
mony with its broad benevolence, and demonstrating 
its adaptedness to man in every condition. All cavils 
and oppositions will give way before that perfection of 
wisdom and of grace which touches all hearts alike 
with heavenly influence, and brings the babbling and 
hostile races of men into loving brotherhood, so that 
there is neither Jew nor Greek, bond nor free, male 
nor female, for all are one in Christ Jesus. A Hindoo 
and a New Zealander met upon the deck of a mission- 
ary ship. They had been converted from their 
heathenism, but they could not speak to each other. 
They pointed to their Bibles, shook hands, and 
smiled in each other's faces. At last a happy 
thought occurred to the Hindoo. He exclained, 
"Halleluiah!" The New Zealander in delight cried 
out, "Amen!" 

When these halleluiahs and amens shall echo round 
the world, and men that can not speak to each other 
shall love each other for Christ's sake, and all dif- 
ferences of race, of language and of rank shall retire 
before the universal halleluiah that binds them all in 
a divine fellowship, this miracle of grace, grander 
than all miracles of power, will be the crowning evi- 
dence of the divinity of the religion of Jesus, before 
which all unbelief must give way, and the kingdoms 
of this world become the kingdoms of our Lord and 
of his Christ. That blessed consummation may seem 
very far off; but it may be nearer than you think. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 225 

These missionary efforts are doing more than you see 
on the surface. They are drilling here and there into 
hard rock, and their progress seems slow ; but every 
now and then there is a blast that tells of prog- 
ress. Let us drill steadily, and pack away here and 
there, in the very heart of the flinty rocks, the dyna- 
mite of gospel truth, and plant the batteries of gospel 
churches, and stretch between these the wires of 
faith, and get everything in readiness.' It may take 
many years to do all this. Much of our work may be 
subterranean, and to the unbelieving eye may seem to 
be all in vain. Even when all is done, we may have 
to wait for favorable conditions of success. But when 
the shafts have all been completed, and the dynamite 
has been properly bestowed, and the batteries have 
been erected, and the wires have been stretched, He 
who governs all, and knows the time, has but to com- 
mand the key to be touched, and Hell-Gate itself will 
explode at his command. We can not turn men's 
flinty hearts to God. It can only be done by divine 
power. But that power operates according to known 
laws, under given conditions. We can mediate be- 
tween the power of God and the stubborn hearts of 
men. We can do the drilling. We can lodge the 
dynamite in its place. We can plant the batteries. 
We can stretch the wires. And we can touch the 
key that lets in the power of God upon the stubborn 
hearts of men and breaks them in pieces. God has 
highly honored us in granting us a share in this blessed 
work. We can preach, we can teach, we can live for 
Christ. If we can not go ourselves to work in the 
far-off quarries, we can supply the money that will 
enable others to go. And we can work at home to 



226 FOREIGN MISSIONS, 

interest others, and prevail on them to give their 
money and their work. 

Dr. E. C. Wines recently reported % the history of a 
convict — an imprisoned thief, who, while in prison, 
was brought to repentance. After his release, he 
established so good a Christian reputation, that when 
he offered himself to a benevolent organization to be 
educated for the missionary field, he was accepted, 
and made rapid progress in his studies. At the 
seminary he made the acquaintance of a student who 
shared his own ambition to redeem what remained of 
life to the noblest purposes. They went together into 
the very heart of heathendom in India, among tribes 
that had never seen the face of a missionary — the 
Santhals. The result in eight years is a Christian 
population of 6,000; actual communicants, 2,100; 
churches, 30; schools, 40; training schools, 2, and 
the prospect of a college for native preachers next 
year. All this without cost to any missionary 
society, and the churches and schools entirely self- 
supporting. Thus, if we neglect the work, God 
will raise up men out of the very prisons to per- 
form it. As, in our Lord's time on earth, the 
publicans and harlots went into the kingdom of 
God before the respectable Scribes and Pharisees, 
so now the very thieves go into God's great vine- 
yard ahead of us Only sixty millions of dollars in 
twenty years to send the gospel to the heathen, 
but six hundred millions of dollars in one year for 
strong drink ! Shall this continue to be the disgrace 
of Christendom ? 

My brethren, let us awake to our duty. The 
night is far spent ; the day is at hand ; let us cast off 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 227 

the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. 
Our duty is plain. The world is perishing. It can be 
saved only by the gospel. We have the gospel. God 
gave it to us. We hold it in trust. We are debtors 
to all who have it not, and, as much as in us is, we 
must preach it in all the world. 



BIBLE TRANSLATION. 

Address before the American Bible Union, Phila- 
delphia, May 21, 1864. 

When Lord Bacon undertook the Great Installa- 
tion, to recover the realms and laws of physical science 
from doubt and mystery, and call the intellectual world 
back from their universal apostasy, he found, in his 
approaches to the temple of Truth, four species of 
idols, blockading the entrance with their busy and de- 
voted tribes of worshipers. These he denominates 
the idols of the tribe, the idols of the den, the idols of 
the market, and the idols of the theater. The idols of 
the tribe are those which are inherent in human nature 
— the universal tendency to hasty and false conclu- 
sions ; to put appearance for reality ; to allow the 
immediate to ignore the remote ; to suffer superstition, 
arrogance and pride to smother the calm voice of 
truth, and hinder the patient investigation of principles. 

The idols of the den are those of the individual, those 
which spring from idiosyncrasies, education, and the 
blind deference paid to revered authors, etc. The love 
of novelty, of antiquity, of this or that favorite sys- 
tem, or party, or leader, occupies the den, and inter- 
cepts or corrupts the light that would enter. 

The idols of the market spring out of the commerce 
and association of men, and assert their dominion prin- 
cipally through words and names> which come to have 
a talismanic power over the undiscriminating multitude. 

"Great is Diana of the Ephesians. " 

328 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 22g 

The idols of the theater are those which spring from 
theories and dogmas of philosophy, which, in a ficti- 
tious and theatrical show, parade their false and hollow 
attractions, and hold men spell-bound by the weight of 
names, reverence for antiquity, and veneration for mys- 
tery, so as to be insensible to the attractions of truth, 
which comes in simpler dress, and often with a sterner 
mien. 

Although Bacon treated of these chiefly as impedi- 
ments to the restoration of physical science, every 
worker in the field of progress has found the same 
obstacles in his way. Especially is it true in the efforts 
for the instauration of religious truth. There is a fear- 
ful idolatry reigning in the hearts of men. We wonder 
at the constant departures of Israel from the stupen- 
dous displays of Jehovah's presence and power, to bow 
down to the paltry idols of surrounding nations; yet 
we forsake more glorious shrines of truth to give our 
devotions to the idols of the tribe, the den, the mar- 
ket, or the theater. We especially marvel to see those 
tribes, at the very base of Sinai, on the very environs 
of divine majesty, creating a golden calf, and merrily 
dancing around an awkward piece of human workman- 
ship, until the fruit of their apostasy is seen in a 
mutilated law, and the wide-spread reign of death. 
Yet, at the base of Mt. Zion, amidst the sweet voices 
and pure light of inspiration that break upon us from 
the Jerusalem above, do not we erect our idols of tribe 
and den and market and theater, and witness a broken 
law, and spiritual death as the result ? I venture to say, 
without knowing much of the private history of the Bible 
Union and the translators she employs, that they have 
seen and known all these idols uplifting their heads, to 



230 BIBLE TRANSLATION, 

stay them in their work. I should not be surprised if 
many who fail to approve this enterprise would find, 
if they searched aright, that their disapproval has been 
whispered into their ears by some of these idols. And 
as a preparatory admonition to all acceptable investi- 
gation of this and every other theme of truth, I de- 
sire to repeat the apostolic admonition: " Little chil- 
dren, keep yourselves from idols." Translators, man- 
agers, patrons and inquirers, all need a thorough lus- 
tration at the laver in the outer court before they enter 
the temple to live in the light of the 'seven-branched, 
golden candelabrum, or dare to penetrate the Holy 
of Holies, with Urim and Thummim to seek from 
Him that dwelleth between the cherubim a knowledge 
of His will. 

When William Tyndale was about to suffer martyr- 
dom for his translation of the Scriptures, and his faithful 
advocacy of God's word, his dying prayer was : " Lord, 
open the eyes of the King of England." At every 
step of progress in the discovery and development of 
truth we have need to offer a similar prayer in behalf 
of the multitudes of opposers. We look back with a 
sort of horror on the dark and bloody period when the 
bones of Wickliffe were dug up and burned, and Tyn- 
dale was given to the flames, and Luther was hidden 
away from the rage of his enemies, that he might trans- 
late the Word of God ; and multitudes of those whom 
they enlightened were flayed alive, cast down from 
towers, starved in prisons, suffocated in caves, driven up 
the mountains to perish in the snows, and subjected to 
every kind of torment that fiendish ingenuity could de- 
vise, for no other crime than that of reading, loving and 
circulating the Bible. We weep as we read of the 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 23 1 

heroic Waldenses, in the valley of Luzerna, when, 
twenty-four hours being given them to choose between 
abandoning the Bible or exposure to fire, sword and 
cord, on bended knee, they said : "We here promise, 
our hands on the Bible, and in the solemn presence of 
God, to maintain the Bible, whole and alone, though 
it be at the peril of our lives, in order that we may 
transmit it to our children pure as we received it from 
our fathers." We garnish the sepulchers of these 
heroes, and build them monuments, and say, "If we 
had lived in that day, we would not have done as did 
the religionists of that time!" And yet, how eagerly 
we oppose enterprises which involve loyalty to the 
same principles for which the faithful men of the Past 
suffered ! 

Whether the Bible shall be translated at all into the 
vulgar tongue, and whether it shall be translated fully 
and faithfully ', are questions involving the same prin- 
ciples. He who decides in favor of partial and un- 
faithful translations, whose timid conservatism, or 
sectarian bigotry, or ignorant superstition, would raise 
a cry against the fullest, clearest blaze of light that the 
most accurate translation can give, ought, for consis- 
tency's sake, to give his voice for quenching entirely 
the light which he fears, and rank himself with those 
who dishonored Wickliffe, killed Tyndale, discouraged 
Coverdale, sought the life of Luther, burned the trans- 
lated Bible, and raised the arm of power against all 
who endeavored to make the Bible the Book of the 
People. Still do we need to pray, "Lord, open the 
eyes of men that they may see." The squint eye of 
unbelief, the blear eye of prejudice, the jaundiced eye 
of the sectarian zealot, the closed eye of the bigot, 



232 BIBLE TRANSLATION, 

the distorted eye of the superstitious, all need to be 
anointed with true eye salve. When Lord Nelson, in 
a naval battle, was signalled to abandon the fight, he, 
determined not to obey orders, put the glass to his 
blind eye, and declared he could not see the signal ! 
Many, for a similar reason, but from a less honorable 
motive, affect to investigate, when in fact they do but 
put the glass to the blind eye ! But, as we look over 
this audience, let us rather say, with the Apostle: " Be- 
loved, we are persuaded better things of you, and 
things that accompany salvation, though we thus 
speak." 

The argument for a better translation of the Scrip- 
tures is very plain, very clear, and, it seems to us, 
very cogent. 

1. God has spoken to man. He has chosen language 
— human language, written language, as the most de- 
sirable medium of communication between His Spirit 
and man's spirit — between the heart of man and his 
Maker. We have a right to infer, from the fact that 
God has thus selected it, that it is the means best 
adapted to the wants, capacities, and circumstances of 
human nature, of all that God has at his disposal. 
This gives to human language an immense dignity, 
value and sacredness. It is the divinely ordained 
channel through which light and life, love, peace, and 
blessedness, flow from the heart of the Infinite into the 
souls of men. It is the magazine of Jehovah's moral 
power. It is the material out of which is fashioned 
the sword of the Spirit — that sword which pierces to 
the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints 
and marrow, and discovers the thoughts and intents of 
the heart. It is the lamp which, filled with the beaten oil 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 233 

of the sanctuary, shines with heavenly radiance in this 
dark world until the day shall dawn, and the day-star 
arise in our hearts. We are~drawn, therefore, to the 
study of language from the most sacred of all consider- 
ations, and by the most imperative of all necessities. 

2. But human language, from one, has become 
many ; and is undergoing constant changes; so that, if 
God's revelations are meant for all, they must, in what- 
ever language or dialect first spoken, be translated 
into various other tongues. The very first gift, there- 
fore, after inspiration, on Pentecost, was that of trans- 
lation, so that the many nations represented there 
might be able to hear in their own tongues the wonder- 
ful works of God. 

3. The object of translation is to convey the ideas 
that are couched in one language, into another lan- 
guage, by means of words that ' represent the same 
ideas. Translations are perfect in proportion to their 
success in conveying ideas out of one language into 
another. A word is of no value except as it represents 
an idea. If a wrong word is chosen, a wrong idea is 
conveyed, and so far as translation is concerned, a 
falsehood. This makes the work of translation very 
important, and ofttimes very difficult ; and many 
times, where it is imperfectly or unfaithfully done, 
ludicrous or mischievous. For instance, ?n a French 
translation of Paradise Lost, the sentence, "Hail, hor- 
rors, hail," is rendered thus: " Comment vons portez 
vous, les korreurs, comment vous portez vons /" equivalent 
to: "How d'ye do, horrors, how d'ye do?" And 
in a translation of the Vicar of Wakefield, the words, 
M Moses flayed alive," are made to convey the idea of 
" Moses almost devoured alive by fleas." And Shak- 



234 

speare's expression, "So woe-begone, " in describing a 
spiritless and grief-stricken man, is made to read, " So, 
grief, be off with you ! " Now it will do to laugh at 
these blunders in the translation of merely human 
compositions ; but when we think of the danger of 
similar errors in the translation of the words of the 
Divine Spirit, it is really awful to contemplate. If it 
be important, in translating the works of men, that 
their ideas be faithfully conveyed, how infinitely im- 
portant is it that the ideas that were born in the mind of 
God— the thoughts, loves, wishes, yearnings, counsels, 
laws, and ordinances of the Only Wise God — should 
be conveyed with the extremest possible accuracy. 
If, then, from any cause whatever, an ignorance, which 
the imperfect state of Biblical criticism could not en- 
lighten ; an age, whose idols of the tribe, the market, 
and the theater could not be destroyed ; a king whose 
idol of the den controlled him ; a sect or national es- 
tablishment whose authority coerced translators ; if, 
from any cause, the best efforts at translation have been 
materially defective, so as to dim, in any degree, the 
light of God, obscure to any extent the mind of the 
Spirit, corrupt, or impair in any wise, the message of 
truth and holiness ; common sense, righteousness, and 
piety will all say : Correct the errors ; let in more light ; 
give us the whole will of God. Opposition will only 
come from the shrines of the idols to which we have 
referred. 

Let us look at some of the distinguishing character- 
istics of this revelation, in the light of which the need 
of faithful translation may be appreciated. 

I. The word of God is life-giving. It is Hfe-gWmg 
because it is Hght-gWmg. It is, indeed, life-giving, 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 235 

life-sustaining, life-directing; and all these because " the 
entrance of the word giveth light ; it giveth under- 
standing to the simple." The immense quickening 
power of the Word of God, even in its reflex influence, 
in the refractions of its light, may be seen at a glance, 
if you compare heathen with Christian nations, Catho- 
lic with Protestant countries, Medieval with modern 
ages, Protestant countries where the word of God is 
bound, with Protestant countries where it is free. All 
life is sheathed in light. All teeming life of the material 
creation is developed and sustained by the light of 
heaven. The first creative fiat was, ' ' Let there be 
light," and the first spiritually creative fiat is, "Let 
there be light. " Christ is called, therefore, " the true 
light — the light of life." Now the purer and fuller the 
light, the richer and completer the life. Every thing, 
therefore, that dims and obscures the light is an injury 
to the soul. It is not enough that I have sufficient 
light to live by : I want all the light that God has pro- 
vided, in order to all the fullness of life that I am cap- 
able of developing and enjoying. It is not enough 
that you give me a chart that is in the main correct, 
and assure me that many have successfully navigated 
the sea of time by its directions ; if it is not fully cor- 
rect, if it leave out a rock, or shoal, or fail in any par- 
ticular of the exact truth, I have a right to ask, when 
I am about to embark my eternal all, that it shall be 
made correct to the last particular. If God has kin- 
dled the light of a sun in the spiritual heavens, I want 
all the sunshine it can impart. I protest against any 
ecclesiastical system, or creed, or opaque translation 
coming in between that sun and my soul, to eclipse the 
one and darken the other. I object to the clouds of 



236 BIBLE TRANSLATION, 

ignorance that belonged to the past, which a healthy 
gale of Biblical criticism may speedily dissipate, con- 
tinuing to overspread my heavens. I do most earnestly 
protest against any sect, or interest, or aristocracy of 
letters, attempting to bottle up that sunlight, to be 
vended, under denominational patent, in quantities to 
suit purchasers. 

Now does any one pretend that our common version 
does not, in many respects, obscure the light? That 
the comparative meagerness of resources in sacred 
criticism; the overpowering influence of the interests 
of Church and State ; the absolute dicta of the King, 
and many other considerations, did not combine to ren- 
der it imperfect ? Do not all confess that, while it was 
a great and successful undertaking, it is not at all up to 
the present demands of biblical learning ? Moreover, 
does not every one know that the changes in our own 
language, in two and a half centuries, are such as of 
themselves to demand a revision ? 

Nor is it true, as many pretend, that the version is 
as nearly perfect as may be, as conveying a knowledge 
of salvation and of duty ; or that the reason for demand- 
ing a revision is to promote the interests of immersion- 
ists. That the way of salvation and of life may be 
learned from it, and perhaps from any other version, is 
true ; but that these great matters are as perfectly re- 
vealed here as they may be or ought to be, is not so. 
Take an instance: Acts iii. 19. Now much depends 
in the way of duty, here, whether the active or passive 
voice prevails, whether I am simply enjoined to be con- 
verted when times, etc., or whether I am positively 
commanded to turn, that times of refreshment may 
come from the presence of the Lord. I do not care 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 237 

whether one rendering or another shall cut up Calvin- 
ism or Arminianism by the roots, or both of them 
together. I do not care a straw for any or all of the 
isms in the religious world. But I want to know what 
God asks of me, and what God promises to me ; and I 
aver that the common version does not truly represent 
the one or the other. 

Again, Galatians v. 20. Among the works of the 
flesh are heresies : and it is affirmed that they who bring 
forth these fruits of the flesh ' ' shall not inherit the 
kingdom of God." Now by heresies we generally 
understand false doctrines. But suppose we banish the 
idols of the market and of the den, long enough to let 
in the clear light of a true translation. Then, instead of 
heresies, we have sects. Ah ! that alters the matter 
wonderfully. There is many a bitter sectarian who is 
a keen heresy hunter. Generally, the more devoted 
the partisan, the keener his scent of heresy. But if 
sects are among the works of the flesh, and "they who 
do, etc., " then these sects that abound, with their names, 
and their creeds, and their spirit, and their separate 
and jarring interests, must be abandoned, as we hope 
for entrance into the kingdom of God. We give these 
simply as specimens of a very numerous class of pass. 
ages, involving salvation and destiny, where the light 
is greatly obscured. 

2. The word of God is one, and it furnishes a true 
basis of union. Parties and sects are hostile to the 
spirit, genius, and aims of the Bible. It was meant to 
build up one holy and loving brotherhood out of all 
nations and kindreds, and people, and tongues. But 
this original unity and union of the people of God has 
been lost. We are divided into sects and parties, rest- 



338 BIBLE TRANSLATIONS, 

ing much more on philosophical and ecclesiastical 
bases than on scriptural distinctions. The idols of 
the theater have been busy with us; and names and 
theories rule the world. It is not to be ignored that 
translations made under these influences have partaken 
somewhat of the spirit and the philosophy and the 
prejudice of sect — and that one of the great steps by 
which the union of Christians is to be squght, is, a com- 
plete translation of the Scriptures. That this will lead 
to the sacrifice of many cherished names, and pet no- 
tions, and party idols, there can be no doubt. There 
will be a terrible slaughter among the idols of tribe 
and den and market. But what of that ? A man who 
refuses to surrender his cherished idols to the demand 
of the one living and true God is, in the proper sense 
of the term, an infidel. He has never yet been bap- 
tized in the "spirit of truth." I am earnest in 
affirming my conviction that the salvation of the world 
depends very much on the union of the people of 
God ; that the full glory of what we generally call 
Protestantism has never yet been seen ; that a united 
heart and united front on the part of Christians would 
shake the empire of hell to its foundations ; that the 
Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-American races, must lead in 
that work ; and that a correct English version, there- 
fore, as laying the basis for such a union, is of the 
grandest importance. 

I would not depreciate the value of translations into 
other languages. The objects of this organization 
should be limited by nothing less than the supply of 
the whole world with faithful translations of the Bible. 
But our first great and crying need is a correct English 
translation, both for the discussion it will awaken, and 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 239 

the union to which it will lead of the spiritual forces 
and energies of the race that is to take the lead in the 
Christianization of the world. 

3. The word of God is sanctifying. "Sanctify 
them through thy truth, etc. ' ' Every word of God is 
pure. The cultivation of all spiritual tastes, the unfolding 
of all spiritual beauty and energy is through the truth. 
It requires no argument here to show that "the things 
which the Holy Spirit teacheth " can only be " spirit- 
ually discerned " when the tvords which the Holy 
Spirit employed, or their equivalents, are given to us. 
There are many most attractive and enrapturing beau- 
ties of spritual truth which a bungling translation hides 
from the unlearned reader. 

So much on the general question of the desirableness 
of translation. A few words on its practicability. 

I am free to say that the practicability of this work 
is not so readily seen as its desirability. The very con- 
siderations urged in favor of its importance suggest to 
us the difficulty of the undertaking. The yet imperfect 
state of sacred criticism, the pride of party, the tyranny 
of opinionism, alike interfere to make it difficult of exe- 
ecution, and difficult of appreciation. Translators need 
a thorough purging of the idols of the den. And so 
do readers. For we are not apt to bless the man that 
takes away our gods, even though it is for our good. 
We are far more apt to judge of the merits of a trans- 
lation by the interests of our party, than of the merits 
of our party by the light of a faithful translation. It 
is a peculiar state of grace to reach these days, to be 
able to say: "Lord, let me know thy truth, if my 
party perish, if every cherished conviction of my heart 
is doomed; if life itself is the price demanded, Lord, 



24O BIBLE TRANSLATION, 

let me know thy truth." But while it is difficult, it 
is not impossible. We must recognize the difficulty, 
look it full in the face, and meet it fairly and manfully. 
It seems to me that, in order to a complete work, wf 
need : 

1. To do justice to the labors and achievements of 
the Past. I have no sympathy with that spirit which 
rails at the past, or attempts to undervalue the per- 
formance of predecessors. We stand on their shoul- 
ders. If they fall, we fall with them. Honor is es- 
pecially due to those who gave us our common version. 
It has uncommon merits. Its long hold on the public 
mind, the sacred affection with which it is regarded by 
the enlightened, its influence in forming and preserv- 
ing our language, all give it a high claim on our rever- 
ence. In its general style and form of expression, I 
think it is simply inimitable, and ought not to be dis- 
turbed. It is revision that is needed. 

2. A multitude of counselors. No literary work under 
the heavens calls for so much counsel, cooperation, 
sympathy and searching criticism as this. Individuals 
may furnish valuable contributions to sacred literature 
in the shape of new translations ; but it is simply im- 
possible that any of these can challenge acceptance as 
standard translations. The present version owes its 
popularity in part to the fact that it was the result of 
the assembled wisdom of so many scholars — represent- 
ing so largely the learning and piety of the age and 
country. Any revision, to be entitled to acceptance, 
must be able to show that it has secured the ripest 
scholarship of the old world and the new ; and the 
largest and freest consultations and criticisms of the 
highest tribunals of learning, without regard to party. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 24 1 

3. It must be free from denominational control. There 
is not a religious party on earth pure enough to be en- 
trusted with such a work. Men pure enough may be 
found in these parties — but the parties must not con- 
trol them. There is not a party that will not be shorn 
of strength, and stripped of pretensions by a thorough 
revision. If men do not desire the reformation or the 
overthrow of their parties, they ought not to go in for 
revision ; for no party can stand on the pure word of 
God. Let revisers, then, be free — free as the truth of 
God will make them. 

4. The most perfect critical apparatus. This does 
not need many words. Such a work, to come up to 
the demands of the times, needs an accumulation of 
authorities and auxiliaries, far beyond what private 
means will procure. 

Lastly, It needs men of rare attainments, of catholic 
spirit, of profound piety, to whom there is no desirable 
treasure but God and His truth ; and for these men, 
time, abundance of time to carry on the work deliber- 
ately and thoroughly, and to secure the fullest criticism, 
and revision, and re-revision, until it is what it ought to 
be. There is more danger of going too fast than too 
slow. 

Whether all these wants are met in the American 
Bible Union, I leave for those to say who are more in- 
timately acquainted with its means and appliances. 
That it has a basis for the fullest success, I fully believe ; 
and if it is in any thing at fault, the means of reforma- 
tion, and, I trust, the spirit of reformation, are not 
wanting. 

It belonged to another age and generation to toil 
and suffer to give the Bible, in the vulgar tongue, to 



242 BIBLE TRANSLATION, 

the people. A glorious work, in the last halt century, 
has been wrought in this field. It is ours to carry for- 
ward the work by perfecting the work of translation, 
so that all nations may have that word of life in the 
nearest possible approach to its original purity and 
integrity. It is a sacred, a difficult, and a most be- 
nevolent mission. We must not expect it to be fully 
appreciated while it is in process of development. 
Other generations will reap in joy the benefit of what 
you sow in tears ; and, if success crown the effort, 
millions yet unborn, when bathing their spirits in the 
pure light of heaven, reflected on them in faithful 
translations, will bless the God of truth for the toils 
and expenditures that prepared for them such a herit- 
age, and opened the way for them up beyond all the 
polluted streams of human tradition, to the very foun- 
tain of the water of life. 



"SINGLENESS AND WORTHINESS OF PUR- 
POSE." 

In promptly accepting the invitation with which I 
was honored through your worthy president, to address 
you on the present occasion, let me assure you that I 
had quite another thought from that of furnishing an 
hour's entertainment to you and your friends. It would 
hardly be worth while to run away from the toils of as 
busy a life as mine, and come so far, merely that we 
might spend an hour or two in an interchange of the 
compliments and courtesies that are deemed necessary 
in rounding out the labors of the College year, or in 
completing the duties of the College course. Nor can 
I compliment you by saying that I have been drawn 
hither by a personal interest in you ; for, personally, you 
are strangers to me, and I to you. It would be simply a 
falsehood were I to say that I had any more personal 
interest in you than in any other similar number of 
young ladies and gentlemen, here or anywhere else in 
the wide world. But my interest in you, if not personal, 
is not less deep or less strong on that account. I have 
come because I feel that the mission of every educated 
man and woman, in this country and in this age, is 
sacred and grand ; and because it is worth while to 
travel a thousand miles to meet you on the threshold 
of a new life, if I may be able to speak a word, drop a 
hint, or lodge in your minds an idea, that shall help 
you in utilizing the educational forces you have been 

here accumulating, and give to your lives, in any 

343 



244 SINGLENESS AND WORTHINESS OF PURPOSE. 

degree, a truer inspiration. You must allow to age a 
superior authority in some things. I have lived long 
enough to know that the most righteous and benev- 
olent work that can be done in behalf of beginners, is 
to transfer to them the experiences of those who have 
gone before them in the journey, and thus enable them 
to escape the blunders, misfortunes and failures of their 
predecessors. 

But I must take a still broader view before you can 
understand the motive which prompts this address; 
and I am careful in stating this, because I want you in 
full sympathy with me, in the views of life and of duty 
which I propose to submit. It is not worth while for 
me to tell you what doubtless you have already been 
told many times — that this country of ours is a great 
country ! It is really much greater than our politicians 
and our Fourth of July declaimers, in their swaggering 
oratory, know how to express. But I call your atten- 
tion to a fact not so often dwelt upon, but which greatly 
concerns your future — that we are making, in this 
great country of ours, a daring and most hazardous 
experiment with human nature ; an experiment which 
implies a larger faith in humanity than anything in the 
history of the ages will justify ; an experiment which, 
if successful, is fraught with the most blissful conse- 
quences to all future ages; but which, if unsuccessful, 
will drive a plowshare of ruin through all the fond 
hopes of patriots, statesmen and philanthropists, dissi- 
pate all our bright dreams of civil and religious liberty, 
and relegate the race to the control of despotic author- 
ity. It is a sublime experiment — sublime in the confi- 
dence it reposes in humanity. We have opened this 
vast country to men of every languag-e, condition and 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 245 

character, and we extend to them, as soon as they 
arrive here, the rights of citizenship. We have en- 
franchised our negro population. We have said that 
ignorance and moral degradation shall be no bar 
to citizenship. The merest pauper of the old world, 
the most boorish among her peasantry, scarcely ele- 
vated above an oyster in ideas, comes here and is 
clothed with a sovereignty equal to that of the most 
enlightened of our native-born and home-educated 
citizens. We think we can swallow him and assimilate 
him. Even the "heathen Chinee," though somewhat 
revolting to the taste of some of our brethren on the 
Pacific coast, is destined to be swallowed, pigtail, joss- 
house, and all. We have a notion that there is vitality 
enough in our basis population to allow us to take in 
and digest all these multitudes of ignorant and debased 
people ; as well as all the educated atheists and revolu- 
tionists that come — even the fanatical and devilish 
Nihilists — and incorporate them safely as bone of our 
bone and flesh of our flesh. If we may take the facts 
of the present year as a guide, four hundred villages of 
a thousand inhabitants each could be planted annually 
in our land of these immigrants. Or a city could be 
formed each year as large as Cincinnati or St. Louis — I 
had almost said as large as Chicago ; but it is impossible, 
in the nature of things, that anything in the wide world 
could be quite as large, or as grand, or as prosperous, 
or as wicked as Chicago. We will therefore speak 
within bounds, and say that these immigrants would 
make, every year, a city nearly as large and almost as 
wicked as Chicago. They are to come hereafter in 
greater numbers. Europe is upheaving with revolu- 
tion, from the growing consciousness of power among 



246 SINGLENESS AND WORTHINESS OF PURPOSE. 

her working population. The secret of the Communist 
revolution in Paris was just that. The secret of the 
Nihilistic terrors in Russia, that have crept into every 
dark corner of the Emperor's palace and lurk under the 
foundations of all her institutions, is the same. It is 
a revolution against the higher and the middle classes 
by the lowest and most oppressed order, guided by the 
skill and craft of educated malcontents. If they fail, 
they fail not because they lack intelligence or bravery, 
but because they lack virtue and humanity. They are 
impious and sensual and godless — therefore they fail. 
But the strife with these classes is not over. France 
is full of them. Italy teems with them. They are a 
constant and a growing menace to the imperial author- 
ity in Germany. England conceals a host of sympa- 
thizers. All through Europe they are a powerful and 
a dangerous class. If they fail there, they are coming 
here. In some shape or other, the old strife between 
capital and labor will be renewed. The strike a few 
years ago, along all our lines of railroads, with its out- 
breaks of violence, and defiance of authority, wide- 
spread disaster, and impudent demands, was but a 
foretaste of a revolution yet to come. Powerful and 
invincible monopolies are growing up in this land, and 
wealth is accumulating in the hands of the few. What is 
the result to be when the conflict comes — when our popu- 
lation becomes denser, and the rich and the poor be- 
come classes, and on the side of poverty shall be found 
these immense importations from foreign lands, clothed 
with the power without possessing the character of 
citizens, and under the control of demagogues base 
enough to use them for any selfish purposes ? You 
say, We have free schools, and will educate them, and 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 247 

transform them into intelligent and moral citizens. If 
so, it will be well. But do you know that to-day some 
twenty-five per cent, of our population can neither read 
nor write ? Moreover we must not ignore the fact that 
our public schools are becoming less and less moral in 
their teachings, and are confining themselves mainly to 
intellectual culture. The demand is growing to banish 
the Bible from the schools ; and that means all instruc- 
tion about God and moral responsibility. 

Our colleges, with a few honorable exceptions, are 
little better. Their moral and spiritual influence is not 
worth mentioning. Then, you must remember that, 
with growing wealth and power, the public conscience 
is greatly debauched, so that fraud, corruption and 
dissipation abound in high places — in Congress, in 
State Legislatures, in courts, in commercial circles, in 
Boards of Trade, in political rings, and in social circles. 
The very foundations of society are trembling. The 
marriage bonds are losing their sacredness, and doc- 
trines as to social life the most dangerous and the most 
revolting to pure minds, are shamelessly avowed. On 
the other hand, the grimmest despotism of the Dark 
Ages has its advocates here, and opposition to free 
schools, to freedom of the press, and freedom of con- 
science, is boldly proclaimed by an ecclesiastical power 
that is growing rapidly, and that only loses its power 
in the old world to transfer it to the new. 

I am putting the dark side of things before you ; 
I am doing it for a purpose. There are stirring times 
ahead of us. You who are about to come on to the 
stage must not think you can be idle spectators of con- 
flicts soon to come, which will tax the ability and the 
moral heroism of every educated mind and heart. I 



248 SINGLENESS AND WORTHINESS OF PURPOSE. 

do not fear the result if we can maintain the ascen- 
dancy of Christian principles. But I do not hesitate 
to avow my conviction that if we fail here, we fail to 
sustain this mighty fabric of freedom whose founda- 
tions were laid in religious principle, and the rearing of 
whose superstructure has been constantly promoted by 
the energy and inspirations of Christian faith. 

You will now understand what has brought me 
here, and will appreciate my anxiety to impart to you 
something of my own feelings regarding the mission of 
educated minds and hearts to this country and this age, 
and to inspire you with a holy ambition to make the 
life soon to be initiated largely serviceable to your 
race. I believe that the future progress of our race 
towards a true Christian civilization — a civilization 
which earth has never yet known — depends very largely 
on the permanent success of the experiment in behalf 
of free government now going on in this country. I 
believe none the less firmly that the permanent success 
of this experiment depends on the predominance of 
moral and religious culture — on Christian homes, Chris- 
tian schools, Christian teachers, Christian churches, and 
a Christian ministry; and that all these depend, if not 
mainly, yet in no slight degree, on the labors and per- 
sonal and social influence of Christian scholars, going 
out from Christian schools, armed and equipped for the 
gravest and the noblest service in which educated minds 
and hearts can be enlisted. The graduates of such an 
institution as this ought to be, one and all, certified and 
consecrated missionaries of Christian education — pro- 
pagandists of Christian culture ; and that alike for 
Christ's sake, for country's sake, and for the sake of 
humanity. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 249 

This brings me to my theme : * ' Singleness and 
Worthiness of Purpose." 

May I be permitted to inquire of you, young ladies 
and gentlemen, what you propose to do with yourselves 
and your education ? Do not for a moment suppose 
that success in life is assured by gaining a diploma in a 
school of literature, art and science. For every ten 
who succeed there are ninety who never make returns — 
total failures. Shall we look for the causes of failure? 

The first great secret of failure is, that the majority 
of graduates have no fixed principles — no definite pur- 
pose. They go out from college merely to drift. And 
this drifting is the source of the lamentable failures and 
downfalls of educated men. On any stormy and 
treacherous sea, the vessel that is left to drift, with- 
out pilot, or chart, or compass, or destined port, is 
sure of wreck and ruin. It will be drawn into some 
whirlpool, or landed among the breakers, or driven 
in some fierce tempest upon a rocky coast, or en- 
gulfed in the raging waves of the sea. To drift 
safely from New York to Liverpool would be a greater 
miracle than any on record. Even the little ark of 
bulrushes, drifting on the current of the Nile, was only 
safe because God's hand guided it. As little may any 
human life expect to drift successfully over the treach- 
erous sea of Time and make a safe landing either at any 
earthly harbor or at the haven of heavenly rest. An 
aimless life may sometimes be fortunate ; a drifting 
graduate may happen now and then to make his mark. 
But we want you all to be sharpshooters; and this you 
can not be without singleness of aim. 

Next to having no purpose, is the fault of a mixed 
purpose, or an inferior purpose, or a false purpose. A 



250 SINGLENESS AND WORTHINESS OF PURPOSE, 

true logician, if he starts from false premises, is certain 
to reason to a false conclusion. A loose reasoner may 
have false premises, and yet blunder into a true con- 
clusion. So the man of loose p.urpose may, by a mere 
blunder, happen to come out right. But the man 
trained to careful reasoning can not but bring life to a 
false conclusion if he starts from false premises. Rely 
on it, pretty much everything in your future career de- 
pends on the worthiness and the singleness of your pur- 
pose. Were I to ask you now, ' ' What is yonr settled 
purpose of life?" you would tell me, if you answered 
at all, " I mean to be a physician, a lawyer, a preacher, 
a merchant, or a farmer." That may all be well, but 
it does not answer my question. It reveals only an 
inferior, a subordinate purpose, which, as subordinate — 
as a means to a higher end — may be well enough; but 
which, as a final aim, is surely not worth talking about. 
If there is nothing higher and better for us than the 
utilitarian view of life which such an answer presents, 
I do not hesitate to say that our boasted civilization is 
a prodigious farce, and we might as well be remanded 
to primitive savagery. I would as soon be a naked 
savage, with tomahawk and scalping knife, roaming 
through the woods, living on game, and snoring in a 
wigwam, as to stand even at the head of men of litera- 
ture and science, and occupy the heights of our civil- 
ization, if there is nothing better for us than is opened 
by such a view of the ends and aims of education. It 
ignores the native desires of the soul for immortality. 
It opens no approach to the infinite and the eternal. 
It looks on man as a lump of organized matter, who is 
here in this world to analyze soils, separate gases, dis- 
sect bodies, compound pills, sell bread and cheese and 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 25 I 

oleomargarine, or make money out of thunder and 
lightning. And wherefore ? What is all our civiliza- 
tion — what all these treasures of science and art — if 
man has no destiny beyond this life, or if here he can 
make no preparation for it ? I repeat, if this is all — 
this everlasting rush and roar, this fume and sweat, and 
toil and moil of civilization might as well give place to 
the careless freedom and limited wants of savage life. 
What is the value of knowing about oxygen and 
hydrogen and nitrogen, about angles and rectangles, 
and triangles, and hypothenuses, and rhomboids, and 
trapezoids, and microscopes, and spectroscopes, and 
protoplasm, and all the other asms and isms and ites 
and ates, if man is but an animal, whose soul is 

"Doomed o'er the world's precarious scenes to sweep, 
Swift as the tempest travels o'er the deep, 
To know delight but by her parting smile, 
And toil and wish and weep a little while ; 
Then all its parting energy dismiss, 
And call this barren world sufficient bliss." 

It is as an immortal being that education is valuable 
to man; and civilization, with its refinements, has value 
just as it develops us into fitness for the dignities and 
sovereignties of everlasting life. Education, therefore, 
is not merely nor mainly to enable us better to make 
dollars, or to enjoy our ease in this life ; but to impart 
to us ideas, tastes, knowledge and wisdom that shall 
lead us into eternal fellowship with the beauty of good- 
ness and holiness. It is to teach us the alphabet and 
the structure and combinations of the language of im- 
mortality, and to graduate us out of the schools of 
books and technicalities into the school of actual life, 
where, mastering higher problems and attaining to 



252 SINGLENESS AND WORTHINESS OF PURPOSE. 

grander developments in the College of Experience, 
we may be finally graduated, in the great commence- 
ment day, as worthy to stand among the bright immor- 
tals in the paradise of God. Let us dismiss, then, this 
unseemly ambition to obtain an education that will 
merely serve utilitarian purposes in this life — an educa- 
tion whose value can be estimated by dollars and cents ; 
and desire rather to gather all knowledge that can make 
the soul pure and brave and wise and loving and 
holy, and start it on paths of inquiry, whether in the 
realms of physics or metaphysics, in pursuing which it 
may rise to God-like grandeur and blessedness, and as- 
pire to glory, honor and immortality. 

Just here let me guard you against the impression 
of narrowness when we speak of one purpose of life. 
We are not speaking of one earthly purpose, or one 
line of study and of action in this world. There is 
altogether too much danger of running into special- 
ties, and one reason why I favor a broad range of cul- 
ture in our colleges is that unless the foundations of it 
are laid there, and the tastes are there formed that shall 
make it essential to the happiness of the student in 
after life to keep up his studies, the tendencies of the 
age to specialties will dwarf us all into Lilliputian insig- 
nificance in all respects save one. The tendency is 
more and more to a division of labor. Economy, as 
well as exactness, demands that each life shall have a 
specialty. Mathematics, even some special department 
of mathematics, must absorb a man's life, to make him 
a successful teacher. Not ancient languages any more, 
but one ancient language must be the study of a life- 
time. So the eye, the ear, the lungs, the stomach, are 
.becoming special and lifelong studies ; and so, too, in 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 253 

mechanics and in art, a man, to succeed, must confine 
himself to some particular branch, and that a very 
small one. Now, while this may work well for society, 
for the individual it is necessarily a dwarfing process, 
and tends to deformity. I think it was John Stuart 
Mill who said that if a man were to give up his whole 
life to the study and teaching of Greek, it will dwarf 
him as certainly and entirely as to spend his whole life 
making pinheads. The perfection of human nature is 
in the symmetry of its various faculties and powers. 
This projection of one faculty, or of one class of facul- 
ties, beyond all the rest, is as if a man's face would all 
run to nose, and present an enormous proboscis, with 
eyes and mouth appearing as mere gimlet holes ; or 
one great, glaring eye, rolling and winking and squint- 
ing over the whole facial surface. A man to be truly 
great must be, like Goethe, many-sided. Look at 
Blind Tom — all run to music, and a mere idiot in all 
else — and you have a full-blown specimen of what men» 
are tending to under this division of labor. It is sad 
to see "a harp of a thousand strings," capable of such 
infinite combinations and variations, so used that it will 
produce but one tune, no difference how perfectly and 
ravishingly that tune may be played. It all turns to 
squeaks and groans and horrible discords the moment 
you attempt anything else. Such a lop-sided, hump- 
backed, limping, squinting set of dwarfs as we are in 
danger of becoming, is sad to think of — a Brobding- 
nagian, eye or nose, or mouth, or hand, and all the rest 
of the body reduced to Lilliputian proportions, is but a 
symbol of the intellectual and moral deformity which 
must be thus superinduced, unless great care is taken. 
The best safeguard is a thoroughly broad education in 



254 SINGLENESS AND WORTHINESS OF PURPOSE, 

early life. Unless we gain it then, and accustcm our- 
selves to adjust harmoniously the relations of things, and 
study the parts in relation to the whole, and become 
somewhat encyclopedic in our range of knowledge, 
there is a poor chance of success afterward. The 
whole life will revolve in some very small circle. A 
man will be nothing but a bundle of statistics, or he 
will be made up of angles and triangles, or his whole 
nature will be translated into Greek, or the whole uni- 
verse will run into pills and blisters, or the hum and 
whirr of machinery will be the only music that hath 
charms, or his piety will become so insane that all this 
gay world, with its mighty and glorious activities, will 
be only a dark and thorny desert. In some pitiful little 
eddy, around some infinitesimal vortex, his vessel will 
whirl forever, while the boundless ocean lies all unex- 
plored around him. 

Do not understand us, then, when we speak of 
singleness of purpose, to refer to any one of the pur- 
suits of this life ; but to the grand ultimate purpose of 
life, under which all the honorable callings of life may 
find their true subordinate place. 

What is the ultimate purpose of my life, and to 
what end am I to direct the educational forces now in 
my possession ? That is the question which awaits 
your answer. I will not conceal from you that the 
answer is attended with difficulties. To the unedu- 
cated mind, accustomed blindly to revere the traditions 
which have descended from generation to generation in 
the family, it may offer no difficulty. But to the edu- 
cated mind — to the ear trained to listen to all the con- 
flicting theories of physics and metaphysics in the 
present age, and made familiar with the bold researches 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 255 

of Materialism, fearlessly questioning everything that 
relates to God, to spirit, to revelation, to miracles, to 
morals, and which would bind up everything — even the 
mind and heart and conscience of man — in the iron 
chains of blind necessity, it is not so easy a task to 
settle upon fixed principles in morals and religion, and 
start out upon life with a definite and untrembling 
faith. It is all the more difficult because students get 
just such a smattering of these teachings as to unsettle 
their faith, but not enough to recover them from the 
paralysis and enable them to rest on their faith all the 
more firmly because it has been assaulted in vain. 

The present tendency of philosophy is back to 
Locke's sensational theory. Any one who has watched 
the alternations of the theories of intellectual science, 
as exhibited in the teachings of Descartes, Male- 
branche, Locke, Stuart, Hume, Beattie, Brown, Kant, 
Hegel, Cousin, Berkeley, Hamilton and Mill — to go no 
further — is aware of the alternate triumphs of different 
and opposing schools, ranging from the lowest sensa- 
tionalism to the highest transcendentalism. Material- 
ism, realism, idealism, have all had their day. The 
tendencies, are at present to Materialism. There is a 
stupendous scheme, which has gradually grown up, 
and by master minds, like those of Herbert Spencer, 
Buckle, Huxley, Tyndall, Darwin, Lecky, Haeckel, and 
others, seeks to reduce the operations of matter and 
mind to the control of blind natural forces, exclude the 
possibility of miracles, and eliminate entirely from the 
problem the idea of a personal God. At best it is 
but Pantheism ; legitimately, it leads to the blankest 
Atheism. It is not merely in the realms of the material 
that they attempt to apply their reasonings, but equally 



256 SINGLENESS AND WORTHINESS OF PURPOSE, 

in the realms of the intellectual and moral. Not only 
geology, physiology and chemistry, but astronomy, 
philology, geography, history, are put under tribute. 
The worlds and systems were formed by the operations 
of uniform laws — there was no creative act. The 
source of life is found in protoplasm, whose constituent 
elements are all ascertained. . Vegetable, animal and 
intellectual life has been gradually and scientifically 
developed from very low and rude primitive forms. 
Character is formed under the controlling power of 
seas, mountains, plains, winds and suns — so that, given 
the latitude, longitude and contour of a country or 
city, and its physical characteristics, it can be figured 
out with certainty the number of robberies, arsons, 
riots, and debaucheries that must take place in any- 
given period. There is therefore an end to human 
responsibility, an end to divine authority, and an end 
to Christ and his religion. This "dirt philosophy," 
with its iconoclastic spirit, pervades modern literature 
and science to such an extent that it is impossible to 
avoid contact with it. And it is not surprising that 
many of the minds called educated are somewhat be- 
wildered as to the principles that shall guide future 
life. Whether they are but the creatures of an iron 
necessity — 

"Born, living, dying, 

Reaving the still shore for the troubled wave, 
Battling with storm-clouds, over shipwrecks flying, 

And casting anchor in the silent grave ;" 

or whether they are creatures of God, clothed with 
responsibility, and capable of immortality, is a ques- 
tion of such magnitude and difficulty, that it seems 
like presumption in a young man or woman to attempt 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 25/ 

to answer it. Yet every one must answer it, if it is to be 
worth living, and if your years of hard study and dis- 
cipline here are to be of any value to you hereafter. 

Let me help you to a solution of this most grave 
difficulty. Let me show you that there is a rock in 
the midst of this troubled sea of doubt and despair 
where you can plant your feet firmly ; and that there 
is a pilot who can guide you over these troubled waters 
in a prosperous voyage to a safe landing. 

I. It is well, in deciding on principles, to look to 
their legitimate results. "Ye shall know them by 
their fruits." We can often decide on their trust- 
worthiness by the fruit they bear, even when we are un- 
able to detect wherein their untrustworthiness consists. 

Among the writers of the present time whose influ- 
ence is cast in with this materialistic philosophy, with 
those whose voices are raised against the supernatural, 
and hence against Christ and his religion, we are sorry 
to mention the eminent historian, James Anthony 
Froude. To show you how far he has gone, we need 
only quote a paragraph from a recent article in the 
International Review — beautifully written, but, in our 
humble judgment, extremely faulty in its statements 
and reasonings. But here is what he says of the 
present status of theology : 

" That we have been startled out of our old positions, 
and that we can never return to positions exactly the same, 
is too plain to be questioned. Theologians no longer speak 
with authority. They are content to suggest, and to depre- 
cate hasty contradiction. Those who doubted before now 
openly deny. Those who believed on trust have passed into 
uncertainty. Those who uphold orthodoxy can not agree o;i 
what ground to defend it. Throughout Europe, throughout 
the world, the gravest subjects are freely discussed, an4 



258 SINGLENESS AND WORTHINESS OF PURPOSE, 

opposite sides may be taken without blame from society. 
Doctrines once fixed as rock are now fluid as water. Truth 
is what men trow. Things are what men think. Certainty 
neither is nor can be more than the agreement of persons 
competent to form an opinion ; and when competent persons 
cease to agree, the certain has become doubtful — doubtful 
from the necessity of the case. This is a simple matter of 
fact. What is generally doubted is doubtful. It is a con- 
clusion from which there is no escape. The universal assent 
which constitutes certainty has been dissolved into the con- 
flicting sentiments of individual thinkers " 

I have quoted this," not because I esteem it true, 
but to show you how Mr. Froude looks upon super- 
natural religion, and hence upon Christianity as a thing 
of the past. Now ask Mr. Froude to state, in the 
light of history, what is to be the result of this loss of 
faith in the supernatural. As an historian, he is famil- 
iar with the workings of all sects of religion and irre- 
ligion, and much more competent to decide on this 
question of fact than on scientific or theological ques- 
tions. In speaking of the influence of Lucretius in 
breaking down the religious sentiment of the Romans, 
and in superinducing a revolution in the public mind in 
favor of materialism strongly analogous to that which it 
is claimed modern science is now producing, Mr. 
Froude says : 

" Nations have never been formed on such principles. 
Nations in their infancy aspire to something else than ma- 
terial prosperity. They have beliefs, enthusiasms, patriot- 
isms, with a savor of nobleness in them. Caesar himself 
owed his conquests to the self-devotion of his soldiers, his 
own affection for them, and to his inconsistent idealism. 
And the experiment of the Roman empire showed that na- 
tions can not any more live by such principles after they 
have arrived at maturity. Coarse minds are brutalized by 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 259 

them. The average mind rejects them and prefers super- 
stition, however wild. Gibbon considered that, on the 
whole, the subjects of the empire enjoyed greater happi- 
ness in the years that intervened between the accession of 
Trajan and the death of Marcus Aurelius than at any period 
before or since ; but it was a happiness in which their nature 
became degraded, and when the shock came of the barbar- 
ous invasions, they had lost the courage to resist." 

And after due consideration of the materialism 
of the present age upon the welfare of society, he 
says, in concluding his two papers : 

" Science has much to teach us, but its message is not 
the last nor the highest. If we may infer the future from 
the past, a time will come when we shall cease to be dazzled 
with the thing which we call progress, when increasing 
wealth will cease to satisfy, nay, may be found incapable of 
being produced or preserved except when relegated to a 
secondary place ; when the illusions which have strangled 
religion shall be burnt away, and the immortal part of it 
restored to its rightful sovereignty. ... A society with- 
out God in the heart of it is not permitted to exist ; and 
when once more a spiritual creed has established itself 
which men can act on in their lives, and believe with their 
whole souls, it is to be hoped that they will have grown 
wiser by experience, and will not again leave the most pre- 
cious of their possessions to be ruined by the extravagances 
of exaggerating credulity." 

We are thus warned against the prevalent material- 
ism, with its atheistic and degrading tendencies, by 
one who knows whereof he speaks as few are permitted 
to know, and who is sufficiently in sympathy with it 
to prevent him from acknowledging anything to its 
discredit beyond what truth compels him to acknowl- 
edge. We are saved the necessity of exploring a sys- 
tem whose advocates thus submit to us such a decided 



260 SINGLENESS AND WORTHINESS OF PURPOSE, 

and unmistakable testimony as the voice of the ages 
respecting its legitimate fruits, its inevitable tendencies. 

2. Look at Christ Jesus. He stands out before the 
gaze of the world, as He has stood for eighteen cen- 
turies. There is none to compare with Him. His 
life and character, as sketched, in anything else than 
polished Greek, by His simple-minded and to a 
considerable extent illiterate biographers, have chal- 
lenged the highest admiration of the great and wise, 
have been a fountain of new life and strength and 
comfort to untold millions of the ignorant and de- 
graded, the meek and the poor of earth ; and even 
coarse and jeering as well as refined and philosophic 
infidels, who came to curse, have had their curses 
turned into blessings as they gazed upon His match- 
less excellence, and they have been constrained to 
say, with Balaam, " How shall I curse whom God 
hath not cursed ? how shall I defy whom God hath not 
defied?" In the whole history of our race there has 
been but one Christ. Though for eighteen hundred 
years the critical eyes of sages, philosophers, states- 
men and poets have scrutinized Him, not one blemish 
has been fastened upon His character, nor have men 
been able to invent or produce an improved Leader 
and Saviour for humanity. It is a character that grows 
upon men as the ages pass along. Dr. Phillip Schaff 
has well said : 

" No biographer, moralist or artist can be satisfied with 
any attempt of his to set forth the beauty of holiness which 
shines from the face of Jesus of Nazareth. It is felt to be 
infinitely greater than any conception or representation of it 
by the mind, the tongue, or the pencil of man or angel. We 
might as well attempt to empty the waters of the boundless 
sea into a narrow well, or to portray the splendor of the risen 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 26 1 

sun and the starry heavens with ink. No picture of the 
Saviour, though drawn by the master hand of Raphael, or 
Diirer or Rubens ; no epic, though conceived by the genius 
of a Dante, or Milton, or Klopstock, can improve on the 
artless narration of the gospels, whose only, but all-powerful, 
claim is truth. . . . Jesus Christ is the most certain, the 
most sacred, and the most glorious of all facts ; arrayed in 
a beauty and majesty which throws the ' starry heavens 
above us, and the moral law within us,' into obscurity, and 
fills us truly with ever increasing reverence and awe. He 
shines forth with the self-evidencing light of the noonday 
sun. He is to great, too pure, too perfect, to have been in- 
vented by any sinful and erring man. His character and 
claims are confirmed by the sublimest doctrine, the purest 
ethics, the mightiest miracles, the grandest spiritual king- 
dom, and are daily and hourly exhibited in the virtues and 
graces of all who yield to the regenerating and sanctifying 
power of His spirit and example. The historical Christ 
meets and satisfies all our intellectual and moral wants. 
The soul, if left to its noblest impulses and aspirations, in- 
stinctively turns to Him, as the needle to the magnet, as the 
flower to the sun, as the panting hart to the fresh fountain. 
He commands our assent, He wins our admiration, He over- 
whelms us with adoring wonder. We can not look upon 
Him without spiritual benefit. We can not think of Him 
without being elevated above all that is low and mean, and 
encouraged to all that is good and noble. The very hem of 
His garment is healing to the touch. One hour spent in His 
communion outweighs all the pleasures of sin. . . . Man- 
kind could better afford to lose all the literature of Greece, 
and Rome, of Germany and France, of England and Amer- 
ica, than the story of Jesus of Nazareth. Without Him, his- 
tory is a dreary waste, an inexplicable enigma, a chaos of 
facts without a meaning, connection and aim ; with Him, it 
is a beautiful, harmonious revelation of God, the slow, but 
sure, unfolding of a plan of infinite wisdom and love ; all 
ancient history converging to His coming, all modern history 
receiving from Him its higher life and impulse. He is- the 



262 SINGLENESS AND WORTHINESS OF PURPOSE, 

glory of the past, the life of the present, the hope of the 
future. We can not even understand ourselves without Him. 
According to an old Jewish proverb : ' The secret of man is 
the secret of the Messiah.' He is the great central light of 
history as a whole ; and, at the same time, the light of every 
soul ; He alone can solve the mystery of our being, and ful- 
fill all our intellectual desires after truth, all our moral aspir- 
ations after goodness and holiness, and the longing of our 
feelings after peace and happiness." 

If any of you should deem this language the extrav- 
agant overflow of religious partisanship, I beg you to 
listen to some of the declarations of worldly men and 
avowed unbelievers. I will not quote Rosseau and 
Napoleon, because their testimony is well known ; but 
I will quote some less known, but equally emphatic 
testimony : 

Goethe, one of the most thoroughly worldly and 
self-sufficient men among modern men of genius, calls 
Christ "the Divine Man," "the Holy One," and 
represents him as the pattern and model of humanity. 

Jean Paul Frederick Richter says of Jesus : "He 
is the purest among the mighty, the mightiest among 
the pure, Who with His pierced hand has raised empires 
from their foundations, turned the stream of history 
from its old channel, and still continues to rule and 
guide the ages." 

Thomas Carlyle, the greatest of hero-worshipers, 
and with whom hero-worship is the only salvation of 
humanity, pronounces Jesus of Nazareth "the greatest 
of all heroes," and His life " a perfect ideal poem." 

Ernest Renan calls Jesus "the incomparable man, 
to Whom the universal conscience has decreed the title 
of Son of God, and that with justice, since He caused 
religion to take a step in advance incomparably greater 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 263 

than any other in the past, and probably than any 
yet to come;" and he closes his life of Jesus with this 
language: "Whatever may be the surprises of the 
future, Jesus will never be surpassed. His worship will 
grow young without ceasing ; His legend will call 
forth tears without end ; His sufferings will melt the 
noblest hearts ; all ages will proclaim that, among the 
sons of men, there is none born greater than Jesus. " 

Even David Frederic Strauss says: "As little as 
humanity will ever be without religion, as little will it 
be without Christ ; for to have religion without Christ 
would be as absurd as to enjoy poetry without regard 
to Homer or Shakspeare. And this Christ, as far as 
He is inseparable from the highest style of religion, is 
historical, not mythical ; is an individual, no mere sym- 
bol. To the historical person of Christ belongs all in 
His life that exhibits His religious perfection, His dis- 
courses, His moral action, and His passion. He remains 
the highest model of religion within the reach of our 
thought, and no perfect piety is possible without His 
presence in the heart." 

Theodore Parker says: "The philosophers, the 
poets, the prophets, the Rabbis — He rises above them 
all. Yet Nazareth was no Athens where philosophy 
breathed in the circumambient air : it had neither Porch 
nor Lyceum ; not even a school of the prophets : 
There is God in the heart of this youth. " 

And as I am speaking to ladies as well as to gentle- 
men, let me close these testimonies with the admissions 
of Frances Power Cobbe, taken from her "Broken 
Lights": "One thing, however, we may hold with 
approximate certainty ; and that is, that all the high- 
est doctrines, the purest moral precepts, the most pro- 



264 SINGLENESS AND WORTHINESS OF PURPOSE, 

found spiritual revelations, recorded in the gospels, 
were actually those of Christ himself. The originator 
of the Christian movement must have been the greatest 
soul of His time, as of all time. If He did not speak 
those words of wisdom, who could have recorded them 
for Him ?" And then she quotes the words of Theo- 
dore Parker, " It would have taken a Jesus to forge a 
Jesus." 

Apart from these testimonies, we must ask you to 
consider a fact in respect to which there is, there can 
be, no mistake. Not only did Jesus accomplish, 
through his gospel, the most extensive and thorough 
regeneration the world has ever witnessed, rescuing 
humanity from the dotage of Roman civilization, from 
the despair into which'the materialism of Lucretius had 
plunged it, and the indescribable moral pollution and 
degradation into which pagan superstition had sunk it ; 
but all along the ages, from then until now, just in 
proportion as Christ has been allowed free play among 
men, humanity has taken on its noblest forms ; govern- 
ments have grown out of irresponsible despotisms into 
responsible institutions and administrations, answer- 
ing to the demands of freedom ; slavery has grown 
hideous, and vice odious ; literature and science have 
flourished ; jurisprudence has purged itself of violence 
and injustice ; charity in a thousand beautiful and^noble 
forms has walked the earth, to bind up the broken 
hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captive, to appoint 
beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, and the 
garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness ; woman 
has risen from slavery to stand at the side of man, and 
man has risen from serfdom to the dignities and re- 
sponsibilities of freedom. The freest and happiest 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 26$ 

nations on earth are Christian nations. The freest and 
happiest among Christian nations are Protestant na- 
tions. And the freest and happiest among Protestant 
nations are those in which Christ is free to deal with 
the minds and hearts of the people, and His gospel has 
free course. And in the freest and happiest nations, 
those communities are purest, kindest, noblest and 
happiest in which Christ is most loved and honored. 

We are dealing with facts and certainties, and in the 
presence of these undisputable facts it seems to me 
that no young man or woman need have a rational 
doubt as to the supreme purpose of life. Admit that 
you are unable to reason out the problem of life satis- 
factorily ; say that modern scepticism has paralyzed 
your faith, and presented arguments and objections in 
regard to the spiritual and supernatural which puzzle 
you and strike you dumb so far as a philosophical or 
scientific answer is concerned ; still, here stands Jesus 
of Nazareth. Here are the facts of His history, and of 
the history of His religion. In the presence of these, 
it is rational to say, ' ' Here is one plank in the ocean 
to which my drowning soul may cling ; here is one 
Leader and Saviour in whom I can trust. Protoplasm 
may perplex me, but I can understand Jesus Christ. 
Matter and spirit are crowded with unsolvable enigmas, 
but Jesus, in language stripped of all mystery, teaches 
me how to subdue the one and purify and exalt the 
other, and cause both body and spirit to glorify God. 
Geology may stagger me with its tremendous testimon- 
ies, as to when and how the world was made ; and Evo- 
lution may bewilder me with curious and startling 
suggestions as to how man came to be ; but Jesus 
shows me plainly how the world may be made the 



266 SINGLENESS AND WORTHINESS OF PURPOSE, 

temple of Jehovah's praise, and how my mysterious 
being may be sanctified and ennobled and clothed with 
immortality. Darwin may bother me about the sur- 
vival of the fittest ; but Jesus shows me how the un- 
fittest may survive ' ' the wreck of matter and the crash 
of world's;" how the very least may become greatest 
in the kingdom of heaven. Locke, and Cousin, and 
Hume, and Reid, and Berkeley, and Hamilton, and 
Mill may drive me to the verge of insanity in the thick 
fog of their metaphysics about the real, the ideal, and 
the intuitional \ but Jesus makes faith as clear as noon- 
day, and teaches my tempest-tossed soul to repose in 
peaceful trust. It is safe to follow Jesus. I can make 
the most out of life by accepting His ideas, His prin- 
ciples, His precepts, the inspirations of the love He 
breathes and the hope He kindles. I can not do better 
for myself or my fellows than to be and do what Jesus 
would have me be and do. And if I admit as a possi- 
bility that any of the materialistic and sceptical systems 
of the day may in the end prove true — if the worst comes 
to the worst, and man, after all, is like the beasts that 
perish — in holding on to Jesus I shall make the most 
of this life, and shall go down into eternal darkness 
cheered with dreams and songs of a heavenly home, 
and shall be lulled to sleep without knowing of my 
eternal doom. If there shall prove to be a scientific 
heaven and a scientific hell, to be reached on scientific 
principles, the precepts and spirit of Christ will edu- 
cate me for that heaven and steer me clear of that 
hell. And, on the other hand, if Christ prove true 
and all these systems liars, then I am safe for time 
and eternity. So, to be a Christian is my only 
safety. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 267 

Did you ever cross the suspension bridge over that 
tremendous chasm at Niagara Falls? Monsieur Blon- 
din once stretched a cable over that same chasm. 
That is more than our modern scientists have been able 
to do with the chasm between matter and spirit — be- 
tween this world and the next ; for they have their 
cable fastened on this side only ; they have never been 
able to stretch it so as to reach the other shore. But 
suppose they could make you believe that they had 
made it secure on the other side also. Would you fear 
to cross on the grand highway at Suspension Bridge, 
over which millions have passed in safety, and prefer to 
venture on Blondin's single rope ? Equally mad, I 
think, is the choice of that young man who will ven- 
ture on the slender rope which modern materialism 
proposes to stretch from the shores of this world to 
the shore of eternity, with any balance pole that 
modern science can furnish, while the highway of 
holiness which Christ has reared — the grand thorough- 
fare by which weary pilgrims, by the million, have 
marched over the chasm of death, stepping to the 
music of heaven on their joyful way to eternal bliss — he 
fears to enter lest it should prove untrustworthy ! 

I conclude, then, on a very broad basis of solid 
fact, that the only worthy purpose of life, and the 
only worthy use to be made of all the teaching you 
have been so toilsomely gathering, is the consecration 
of all you are and all you have to the service of Jesus 
Christ. 

And what is it to be a Christian ? I can only par^ 
tially answer this question here. Its initial step is the 
submission of your life, character and destiny unre- 
servedly to Jesus Christ, to be shaped and guided by 



268 SINGLENESS AND WORTHINESS OF PURPOSE, 

Him for the eternal blessedness and dignity of the 
heavens. And just here I imagine your pride rising in 
revolt. You say, "That may do for ignorant boors; 
but have we toiled all these years to reach the dignity 
and freedom of educated manhood and womanhood, to 
be told that now, just as we find ourselves capable of 
self-direction, we must yield to the absolute control of 
another?" I am well aware how a process of educa- 
tion which elates human nature with a sense of its own 
dignity, and how- the flattering but deceitful philoso- 
phies of the day feed this pride and inflate this con- 
ceit. But pause a moment and consider. You came 
hither, to these halls, to fit yourselves for life. Did 
you deem it a dishonor to submit to your superiors in 
knowledge? No. You said, "I wanted to be fitted 
for usefulness and success in life. I do not know how. 
I am ignorant, and do not know my way out of igno- 
rance. In myself I am helpless. I have faith in you, 
that you can lead me in the right way. I want to put 
myself under your guidance — speak, and I will hear, 
command, and I will obey." Had you not come in 
this spirit, and had you not acted under this convic- 
tion, there would have been diplomas for none of you 
to-day, or henceforth. And can you thus reasonably 
and honorably submit yourselves to earthly guides, and 
spend twenty-one years of life, under tutors and gov- 
ernors, to be fitted to live fifty years longer — and not 
any too well fitted then — and then think it unreason- 
able or dishonorable to be placed under competent 
guidance and instruction to educate you for a life that 
is eternal ? Can you engineer your own pathway 
through this perilous world, and fight life's greatest 
battles, and navigate the stormy waters of time, unde- 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 26q 

ceived by the false lights of wreckers along the coast, 
uncharmed by the songs of sirens, unencompassed by 
fogs and undismayed by darkness, devoid of helm or 
helmsman, of chart or compass, guide your frail bark 
by the meteoric flashes of modern philosophy, and 
reach the desired haven ? No, no, my young friends. 
You have done well, so far, because you have had 
teachers, and have submitted to them. Do not make 
a fatal blunder now, and lose all you have gained. 
Enter Christ's college now, and master the great sci- 
ence of life, and prepare, under the greatest of teach- 
ers, to work out all its mysterious problems. Master 
even its hardest lessons of temptation and suffering, 
until you stand in the senior class, gray-haired and 
wrinkled, but filled with divines t treasures of knowl- 
edge and wisdom, righteousness and holiness, ready for 
examination before Him who searches the heart and 
weighs all actions, and rewards the just. And then, in 
the great Commencement Day, before all worlds, with 
a hundred millions of angels for spectators, you will 
come forth to be crowned with victory, and receive 
your diploma from the hand of Jesus himself, and hear 
from his lips the joyful testimony, ' ' Well done, good and 
faithful scholar; enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." 
I do not underrate intellectual greatness ; but I 
am sure it may be overrated, and that successful stu- 
dents are apt to overrate it. I wish for you the high- 
est success in reaping the fruit of your intellectual cul- 
ture. Of all who go out from this college, but few 
will attain to intellectual eminence. But you may all 
gain the eminence of goodness — and that is better. 
Indeed, I frankly tell you that it would give me no 
pleasure to know that you were all intellectual giants, 



2^0 SINGLENESS AND WORTHINESS OF PURPOSE, 

if that were all. To cultivate the mind alone is only 
to give claws to the tiger and talons to the eagle. I 
once saw a large and splendid painting of the murder 
of Abel. I was told that among the various figures on 
the canvas the devil was to be found, as I supposed of 
course he would be. I looked for a long time in vain 
to find him. I was looking for the horns and hoofs, 
and cloven feet ; but not so had the artist painted him. 
His conception was more just. When I found him, he 
was one of the most magnificent of the personages on 
the canvas. He had a majestic brow and a very at- 
tractive face, as well as splendid form. All the glory 
of high intellect beamed forth from his countenance, 
and he looked like an angel of light. The only place 
where the devil appeared was in his eyes. There, there 
was an expression of heartlessness, and a lurking mis- 
chief and malice that told of keen intellect associated 
with a heart in ruins. I have never forgotten it. That 
is just the Bible conception of the devil — lofty in intel- 
lect, but with a heart in ashes. Intellect divorced from 
morals. And every school that prides itself on high 
intellectual culture, without regard to morals, is after 
the devil's pattern 

It is such men as Howard, Clarkson, Wilberforce, 
Washington ; such women as Elizabeth Fry, Florence 
Nightingale, Emily Judson, and Dorothea Dix, that 
the world holds to be immortal. None of these were of 
royal intellect, but they were of royal heart. Howard 
was a man of very moderate intellectual power. He 
would not, by mere intellecual power, have been known 
beyond his own neighborhood. It was his moral and 
religious qualities, that led him to consecrate his life and 
his means to the relief of the suffering, that made him 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 27 1 

almost the wonder of the world, and gave his ashes a 
place among the sons of fame in Westminster Abbey. 
And it was moral greatness that won the world's ap- 
proval and gave immortality to all the names I have 
mentioned. 

Covet earnestly the best gifts of intellect, and yet 
show I unto you a more excellent way ; for had you 
the tongues of men and of angels, and all the knowl- 
edge of heaven and earth, and power to remove 
mountains, and yet lacked that love to God and man 
which is the heart's true inspiration, you will be but 
clanging brass and tinkling cymbals. And do not be 
betwitched with the boasted science of the present 
time; for, with all its charms, it is heartless; it has no 
power to control the moral nature. 

Let me urge upon you, as the great secret of success 
in life — and certainly not less a secret for the educated 
than for the uneducated — the lesson of singleness oj 
purpose. Have one supreme purpose to which you can 
subordinate all other purposes, and to which you can 
give your whole soul. 

I think it was Kepler who once undertook to verify 
an hypothesis of his by a series, or rather several ser- 
ies, of mathematical demonstrations. It required a 
long time and the assistance of others, and if there 
was a single mistake it would vitiate the whole calcula- 
tion. But he wrought on through weeks and months, 
and I do not know but years ; and when he approached 
the conclusion, as one after another of his painfully 
wrought calculations and demonstrations was completed 
and came out all right, and it was growing into clearer 
light that his calculations were correct, his joy became 
so great that he was compelled to turn away and leave 



272 SINGLENESS AND WORTHINESS OF PURPOSE. 

others to finish the demonstration ; for he feared he 
would die of joy. 

Ladies and gentleman, I do not close by wishing 
you an easy life. But I wish you such success in work- 
ing out the great problem of life and destiny, that alike 
jn your earthly and heavenly callings you will be able 
to conduct your calculations to complete success ; and 
when the period of anxious doubt is over, and the 
clouds are lifted, and "the mists have cleared away," 
that you may know that joy of joys — the joy of com- 
plete victory, of final and perfect success. 



A NOBLE FRIEND OF HUMANITY. 

Address at the Funeral oe President James A. 
Gareield, Cleveland, Ohio, October 26, 1881. 

"And the archers shot at King Josiah ; and the king said 
to his servants, Have me away, for I am sore wounded. 
His servants therefore took him out of that chariot and 
put him in the second chariot that he had, and brought him 
to Jerusalem ; and he died, and was buried in one of the 
sepulchers of his father. And all Judea and Jerusalem 
mourned for Josiah; and Jeremiah lamented for Josiah; 
and all the singing men and singing women spake of 
Josiah in their lamentations to this day, and made them an 
ordinance in Israel, and behold they are written in the 
lamentations. 

"Now the rest of the acts of Josiah, and all his goodness, 
according to that w T hich was written in the law of the Lord, 
and his deeds first and last, behold they are written in the 
book of the kings of Israel and Judah. (// Chron. xxxv. 
23-27). 

"For behold the Lord, the Lord of hosts doth take away 
from Jerusalem and from Judah the stay and the staff, . . . 
the mighty man, and the man of war, the honorable man 
and the counselor, and the eloquent orator. {Isaiah Hi. 1-3). 

" The voice said, Cry. And he said, What shall I cry ? All 
flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower 
of the field. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth, be- 
cause the spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it. Surely the 
people is grass. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth, 
but the word of our God shall stand forever {Isaiah, xl. 6-8). 

This is a time of mourning that has no parallel in 
the history of the world. Death is constantly occur- 



274 A NOBLE FRIEND OF HUMANITY, 

ring. Every day, every hour, and almost every mo- 
ment some life expires, and somewhere there are 
broken hearts and desolate homes. But we have 
learned to accept the inevitable, and we pause a mo- 
ment and drop a tear, and away again to the excite- 
ments and ambitions of life, and forget it all. Some- 
times a life is called for that plunges a large com- 
munity in mourning, and sometimes a nation mourns 
the loss of a good ruler or a wise statesman, or an 
eminent sage, or a great philosopher, or a self- sacri- 
ficing philanthropist, or a martyr who has laid his life 
upon the altar of truth and won for himself an enviable 
immortality. But there was never a mourning in all 
the world like unto this mourning. I am not speak- 
ing extravagantly when I say this, for I am told it is 
the result of calculations carefully made from sufficient 
data that not less than three hundred millions of the 
human race share in the sadness and lamentations, the 
sorrow and the mourning, that fill our land to-day. It is a 
chill shadow of a fearful calamity that has extended 
itself into every home in all his land, and. into every 
heart, and that has projected itself over vast seas and 
oceans, into distant lands, and awakened the sincerest 
and profoundest sympathies in the hearts of the good of 
all nations and among all peoples. It is not only a nation, 
but a world in tears. Not only from Europe, but from 
Asia and Africa ; from thrones and cabinets and legis- 
latures; from princes and nobles and the great of 
earth ; from monarchies and from republics ; from men 
of various races and religions ; from the highest ranks 
of social life, and from the hearts of the children of 
poverty and toil ; in cabins still humbler than that in 
which our dead president was reared, comes a voice of 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 275 

lamentation and woe, so genuine and so deeply pathe- 
tic that for once, at least, the whole civilized world is 
seen to stand in a mournful but tender brotherhood, to 
pay a loving tribute to the memory of a grand man, 
who, rising from the humble ranks of western pioneer 
life, ascended by honorable steps and manful toils to 
the chief magistracy of this great nation, and became, 
by his eminent virtues, great abilities and large ex- 
perience, 

" The pillar of a nation's hope, 
The center of a world's desire." 

It is worth while to pause a moment and ask why 
this is. It is attributable in part, doubtless, to the 
wondrous triumphs of science and art within the 
present century, by means of which time and space 
have been so far conquered that nations once far dis- 
tant and necessarily alienated from each other, are 
brought into close neighborhood, and various ties of 
commerce and of social and religious interests, bring 
them into a fellowship that could not have been known 
in pioneer times. It is likewise unquestionably due, 
in part, to the position of this nation among the 
nations of the earth — a nation which has grown within 
a century to such wondrous power, and which is, in 
fact, a strong pillar of hope in all that relates to the 
highest civilization. Sympathy with this Nation, and 
respect for this great power, lead to these offerings of 
condolence, and to these outpourings of sympathy and 
grief from various nations of the earth ; because they 
have learned to respect us, and they recognize that 
the Nation is stricken in the fatal blow that has taken 
away our beloved President from us. Yet this will 
not fully account for the world-wide sympathy of 



2?6 A NOBLE FRIEND OF HUMANITY, 

which we are speaking. The assassination of rulers is 
not so unusual that there have not been other oppor- 
tunities for such demonstrations of universal horror at 
so monstrous a crime. Not merely respect for the 
Nation's representative but the universal admiration of 
the man inspires this sympathy and gives intensity to 
this horror of the crime that robbed not only our 
nation of its ruler, but the world of a noble friend of 
humanity. 

" He hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been 
So clear in his great office, that his virtues 
Do plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against 
The deep damnation of his taking off ; 
And pity, like a naked, new-born babe 
Striding the blast, or heaven's cherubim horsed 
Upon the sightless couriers of the air, 
Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye, 
That tears shall drown the wind." 

Nor can this unparalleled sorrow be accounted for 
solely or chiefly by the intellectual greatness of our 
fallen chieftain, for many other great men have died, 
and some of them were cruelly murdered. Awarding 
all that the most enthusiastic heart could claim to our 
beloved dead, it is but just to say that there have been 
more eminent educators, greater soldiers, more dis- 
tinguished lawyers, more skillful legislators, more 
princely leaders of mighty parties, and more adroit 
managers of political forces. There is no one de- 
partment in which he won eminence, where the world 
may not point to others who stand higher; and if 
mere intellectual greatness in any one walk of life were 
to call forth the tribute, it might not be considered 
more righteously due here than in other cases. But 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 277 

it is rare in the history of men that any one man has 
combined so much of excellence in all the various 
employments of public life ; who, as an educator 
and a lawyer and a legislator and a soldier and an 
orator and a party chieftain and a ruler, has done so 
thoroughly well in all departments, and wrought out 
such successful results as to inspire confidence and 
command respect and approval in every path of life 
in which he has walked, and in every sphere of public 
activity which he has occupied. 

I think, when we come to a proper estimate of his 
character, and seek after the secret of this world-wide 
sympathy and affection, we shall find it rather in the 
richness and integrity of his moral nature — in that 
sincerity, that transparent honesty, that truthfulness 
which laid the basis for everything of greatness to 
which we do honor to-day. 

As an illustration of this, I may state here a fact 
which is not generally known concerning his early 
life. When James A. Garfield was yet a mere lad, a 
series of meetings was held in one of the towns of 
Cuyahoga County by a minister by no means attractive 
as an orator, possessing none of those graces of oratory 
so attractive to youthful auditors, and marked only by 
entire sincerity, by good reasoning powers, respect- 
able literary attainments, and deep earnestness in seek- 
ing to win souls from sin to righteousness.* Young 
Garfield attended these meetings for several nights, 
and, after listening to several sermons, he came one 
day to the minister and said, ' ' Sir, I have been listen- 
ing to your preaching night after night, and I am 



W. A. Lillis, since dead. 



27$ A NOBLE FRIEND OF HUMANITY, 

fully persuaded that, if true, it is the duty and the 
highest interest of every man, especially of every 
young man, to accept the religion you teach, and 
seek to be a Christian. But really I don't know 
whether your teaching is true or not. I can not say 
I disbelieve it, but I can not say that I fully and 
honestly believe it. If I were sure it were true, I 
would most gladly give to Christ my heart and my 
life." 

After a long talk the minister decided to preach 
that night on the text, "What is truth?" and pro- 
ceeded to show that, notwithstanding all the various 
conflicting theories in ethical science, even in reference 
to the grounds of moral obligation, and all the various 
contradictory religions and theologies of the world, 
there is a sure and eternal reliance for every human 
soul in Christ Jesus as the Way, and the Truth, and 
the Life ; that every soul of man is safe with Jesus 
Christ ; that any young man giving Him his hand and 
heart and walking in His footsteps can not go astray ; 
and that whatever may be the final solution of ten 
thousand at present insolvable mysteries, the man who 
loves Jesus Christ and follows His teachings and realizes 
in spirit and in life the pure morals and the sweet 
purity that He taught, is safe, if safety there be in the 
universe of God ; safe whatever else is safe, safe what- 
ever else may prove unworthy and perish forever. 

After due reflection his youthful listener accepted 
this as unquestionable, came forward and gave his 
hand to the minister in pledge of the acceptance of 
Christ as his Saviour and the guide of his life, and 
turned his back on the sins and follies of the world 
forever. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 279 

M The boy is father to the man," and that pure and 
honest integrity, and that fearless spirit of inquiry, and 
that brave surrender of all the charms of sin and sense 
to convictions of duty and right, went with him from 
boyhood through all his life, and crowned him with the 
honors that are now so cheerfully awarded to him from 
all hearts. 

There is another secret of his success. He com- 
passed all the conditions of virtuous life between the 
log-cabin in Cuyahoga and the White House ; and in 
that wonderfully rich and varied experience still, 
"moving up from high to higher," he touched every 
heart at some point or other, and became the repre- 
sentative of all hearts and lives. He became not only 
the teacher, but the interpreter of all hearts, for he 
knew every condition of life and its needs, and estab- 
lished legitimate ties of brotherhood with every man 
with whom, personally or by his teaching and acts, he 
came in contact. I take it that these, lying at the 
basis of his character, formed the rock on which his 
whole life rested ; and building on this rock by the 
perpetual and untiring industry and earnest culture 
that marked his whole career, he became the honest 
and the capable man who invited and received the 
confidence and the love, the unbounded confidence and 
love of all that learned to know him. 

Nor should we fail to observe that there was such 
an admirable harmony of all his powers, such a 
beautiful adjustment of his working, guiding and in- 
spiring faculties and capacities, such an equable dis- 
tribution of physical, intellectual and moral forces, 
that his nature looked out every way, and had 
sympathy with everything, and found delight in all 



28o A NOBLE FRIEND OF HUMANITY, 

pursuits and studies ; so that he became, through his 
industry and honest ambition, really encyclopedic. 
There was scarce a single chord that you could touch 
to which he would not respond in a way that made 
you know that his hands had touched it skillfully long 
ago ; there was no topic you could bring before him, 
no object you could present to him, that you had not 
cause to wonder at the richness and fullness of infor- 
mation he had somehow gathered ; for his eyes and 
ears were always open, and his heart was always open, 
and his brain was ever busy and equally interested in 
everything — the minute and the vast, the high and the 
low— and in all classes and grades of men. 

He thus gathered up that immense and various 
store of the most valuable practical knowledge that 
made him the eminent man he was, not in any one de- 
partment, but all around, everywhere, in his whole 
beautiful, symmetrical life and character. His was 
"A combination and a form indeed, 
Where every god did seem to set his seal, 
To give the world assurance of a man." 

The solemnities of this hour forbid any further in- 
vestigation of this remarkable life. With its details 
you are already familiar, or, if not, they will be brought 
to notice hereafter, through various channels. It is 
my duty, under these circumstances, in the presence 
of the dead, and in view of all the solemnities that 
rest upon us in a solemn burial service, to call your 
attention to the great lessons taught to you and me, by 
which we ought to become wiser and purer and better 
men. 

I wish to say, therefore, first of all, that there 
comes a voice from the dead to this entire Nation, not 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 28 1 

only to the people, but to those in places of power — 
to all who are honored with trusts in the legislative, 
judicial and executive departments of our Government 
— to our legislators and governors, our military men 
and our leaders of parties, and all classes and grades 
of public and private men in the Union and the States, 
down to those in humblest life who are clothed with 
the dignities and privileges of citizenship. The great 
lessons to which I desire to point you can be expressed 
in few words. James A. Garfield went through his 
whole public life without surrendering for a single 
hour his Christian integrity, his moral purity, or his 
love for the spiritual. Coming into the exciting con- 
flicts of political life, with a nature as capable as any 
of feeling the force of every temptation, with power- 
ful temptations to unholy ambition, with unlawful 
prizes v/ithin his reach, with every inducement to sur- 
render his religious faith and be known merely as a 
successful man of the world, from first to last he 
manfully adhered to his religious convictions and to 
his moral principles, and gathered about him, in his 
terrible sufferings and untimely death, the pure in- 
spirations of the hope of everlasting life. 

I am very well aware of the feeling largely shared 
all over the world by those engaged in political life, 
that a man can not afford to be a politician and a 
Christian ; that he must necessarily forget his obliga- 
tions to God and be absorbed in whatever measures 
of policy may be necessary to personal or party suc- 
cess. 

I therefore call your attention to this grand life as 
teaching an invaluable lesson. I ask you to look at 
this man. I ask you to think of him when, in his 



282 A NOBLE FRIEND OF HUMANITY, 

early manhood he was so openly committed to Christ 
and the principles of the Christian religion, that he 
was frequently found among a people who allow a 
large liberty of prophesying, occupying a pulpit. 
You are now within a few miles of the spot where 
great congregations gathered, week after week, when 
he was first emerging into manhood, to hang upon the 
words that fell from his lips with admiration and en- 
thusiasm. It was when he was known in this char- 
acter that he was invited to become a candidate for the 
Ohio State Senate. 

It was with the full knowledge of all that belonged 
to him in his Christian faith, and his efforts to lead a 
Christian life, that the nomination was tendered to 
him ; and without any resort to dishonorable means, 
he was elected to that office and began his legislative 
career. When the country called to arms, when the 
Union was in danger, and his great heart leaped with 
enthusiasm, and was filled with worthy ambition to 
render some service to his country, it required no sur- 
render of the dignity or nobleness of his Christian life 
to secure to him the honors that fell upon him so 
thick and fast, though he entered upon that career all 
unacquainted with military tactics, and could only win 
his way by the honesty of his purpose and the dili- 
gence and faithfulness with which he seized upon 
every opportunity to accomplish the work before him. 

41 He grasped the skirts of happy chance, 
Breasted the waves of circumstance, 
And grappled with his evil stars, 
And made by force his merit known." 

Follow him in this career until, called from service 
in the field, the people of his district sent him to Con- 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 283 

gress, their hearts gathering about him without any 
effort on his part to allure them. And they kept him 
there as long as he would stay, and they would have 
kept him there yet if he had said so. If, sometimes, 
he was misunderstood, and tempests of opposition 
burst upon him, he stood calm and strong, like a rock 
in a stormy ocean, until the voice of truth hushed the 
winds and stilled the waves, and the hearts of the 
people turned to him with confidence stronger than 
ever. He remained in the House until by the voice 
of the people of this state, he was pointed out for 
the Senate of the United States. When there were 
other bright and strong and grand names — men who 
were entitled to recognition and reward, and alto- 
gether worthy every way to bear senatorial honors, 
there were yet such currents of admiration and sym- 
pathy and trust and love, flowing in from all parts of 
the State in his behalf, that the Legislature at Colum- 
bus but echoed the popular voice when by acclamation 
they gave him that high place. And then again, when 
he went to Chicago to serve the interests of another — 
when, as I know, his own ambition was fully satisfied, 
and he looked with more than gladness to a path of 
life for which he thought his entire education and cul- 
ture had prepared him ; when that great National 
Convention was worn to weariness in the efforts to 
command a majority for any of the candidates named, 
the hearts of delegates turned on every side to James 
A. Garfield. In spite of himself and contrary to 
every feeling, wish and prayer of his own heart, the 
honor of the nomination was crowded upon him, and 
the nation responded with enthusiasm from one end of 
the land to the other. He was elected to the chief 



284 A NOBLE FRIEND OF HUMANITY, 

magistracy under circumstances which, however bitter 
the party conflict, caused all parties not only to 
acquiesce, but to feel proud in the consciousness that 
we had a Chief Magistrate of whom they need not be 
ashamed before the world, and to whom they could 
safely confide the destinies of this mighty Nation. 

Now, gentlemen, let me say to you all — those of 
you occupying high places of trust, and those who 
are called upon to discharge the responsibilities of 
citizenship — the most invaluable lesson to be learned 
from the life of our departed President is that not 
only is it not incompatible with success, but it is the 
surest means of success, to consecrate heart and life 
to that which is true and right, and rising above all 
questions of mere policy, wed the soul to truth and 
right, and to the God of truth and righteousness, in 
holy bonds never to be dissolved. We need this les- 
son. This mighty Nation in its marvelous upward 
career, with its ever-increasing power, opening its 
arms to receive from all lands people of all races, all 
religions and all conditions, hoping in the warm em- 
brace of political brotherhood to blend them with 
itself — that these various races and classes may flow 
together and form a new type of humanity — pre- 
sents before a gazing world a spectacle of freedom, 
strength, prosperity and power beyond anything the 
world has ever known. 

But let me say that the permanency of the work 
and its continual enlargement must depend on our 
maintaining public virtue as well as general intelli- 
gence, and making dominant in all the land those 
principles of pure morality that Jesus Christ has 
taught. Just as we cling to these we are safe; and 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 285 

just as we forget and depart from these, we proceed 
toward disaster and ruin. The broadest patriotism 
and philanthropy demand that we pay attention to 
this lesson. Because we have wisely renounced 
everything that looks to a union of Church and State, 
it does not follow that we may wisely repudiate all 
connection between politics and Christian morals. 
The religion of Christ is the religion of humanity. 
It proposes far grander things than have yet been 
realized in behalf of our race. By its divine doc- 
trine of the Fatherhood of God, and the Brother- 
hood of Man, it patiently and lovingly seeks, through 
the ages to leaven the hearts and lives of men, and 
mould their laws and institutions until wars and op- 
pressions shall cease, peace and good will shall 
everywhere abound, and all material interests shall 
be subordinated to the moral and spiritual. Slowly 
but surely through great conflicts this divine pur- 
pose is being wrought out. All that we glory in 
of freedom, political equality, social security and 
national prosperity is the golden fruitage of this 
divine conception of human nature and human so- 
ciety. But it is only the first fruits of the coming 
millennial harvest. Were I to appeal to the distin- 
guished military and naval officers who share with 
us to day, with sad hearts, in these funeral solemni- 
ties — men who have won distinguished honors in 
their country's service — I am sure that their ex- 
periences of the horrors of war would call forth a 
deep soul-longing for the dawn of that promised era, 
when u nation shall no longer lift up sword against 
nation; neither shall they learn war any more." 
Were I to ask of the eminent statesmen, jurists and 



286 A NOBLE FRIEND OF HUMANITY, 

legislators here present to give us the results of all 
their learning, observation and experience, I doubt 
not they would tell us that while there is much to 
rejoice over in the reign of Liberty and Law, the ideal 
Republic has never yet been realized ; that in regard to 
popular education, the prevention of crime, the sup- 
pression of vice, the treatment of criminals, the recon- 
ciliation of the interests of capital and labor, and the 
righteous administration of civil affairs, there is much, 
very much yet to be attained, which is only attainable 
as the people come more fully under the sway of the 
broad principles of justice and humanity which Christ 
inculcates. But this will be realized by no sudden 
flash of light and power from the heavens, but by the 
leavening powers already referred to. From heart to 
heart, and from life to life, these divine principles must 
spread, until from the hearts of the people they 
ascend to the hearts of legislators, judges and 
rulers, and thus from nation to nation, until "the 
kingdoms of this world become the kingdoms of 
our Lord and of His Christ, and He shall reign 
forever and ever." Every wise and humane legis- 
lator, every righteous judge, every God-fearing and 
truth-loving ruler whose being is permeated with the 
spirit of Christ, is a force in the right direction ; and 
the life and character which we are now contemplating 
have their chief value as a noble contribution towards 
the accomplishment of this grand purpose. 

So, then, over the dead body of our murdered Presi- 
dent may all the people join hands and pledge each 
other, in the presence of God, that they will dismiss 
all unworthy purposes, and love and serve only the 
true and the right, and under the inspiration of the 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 287 

grand principles that Jesus Christ has taught, seek to re- 
alize the high civilization to which His Word points us. 
2. There is a voice to the Church in this death. 
The Church not less than the State is bereaved. James 
A. Garfield was a son of the Church of God. He 
was reared under her influence, received into her em- 
brace in his youth, watched over with loving anxiety- 
through all his remarkable career, borne in her arms 
to the mercy-seat in his days of suffering, and 
bathed in her tears when he died. I am not speak- 
ing blindly when I say that his religious fellowships, 
the sanctifying power of his religious associations, 
and the tender ties that bound him to many of his 
brethren in Christ, had much to do in making him 
what he was ; and he abundantly repaid all the 
brotherly affection lavished upon him in a steady 
devotion to the Church of his choice, clinging 
through all changes of fortune to her service, worship- 
ing at her altars and sharing her burdens. His ex- 
ample of faithfulness is worthy of imitation. But the 
lesson especially suggested to the Church is this : The 
Church found him a poor boy in the wilderness, 
sheltered him from the temptations of the world, and 
inspired his heart with courage to fight the great battle 
of life under the leadership of the Captain of Salva- 
tion. The humble little band of worshipers that thus 
received and encouraged him little dreamed what the 
result would be — that the world would, some day, be 
filled with his praise and lament his death as no death 
was ever before lamented. When the Church opens 
her doors to the lowly and welcomes to her fostering 
care the children of poverty from the wilderness, or 
from the lanes of our cities, she knows not what in 



288 A NOBLE FRIEND OF HUMANITY, 

such a land as this, may be the grand outcome. Gray, 
in his immortal Elegy, suggests what might have been 
the sublime possibilities of life, had those buried in the 
country church-yard been permitted to live : 

11 Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid 

Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire ; 
Hands that the rod of empire might have swayed, 
Or wak'd to ecstacy the living lyre." 

But this is a useless reflection; for what might 
have been never can be. But it is worth while to 
reflect concerning the living multitudes of the toiling 
and neglected poor, that there are wrapped up in 
their lives grand possibilities, which only need to be 
unfolded by Christian culture to be turned into blessed 
certainties. Future Presidents and members of Cabi- 
nets and judges and legislators and leaders of armies 
may be to-day hidden in obscurity in the humblest 
walks of life, waiting for the quickening voice of 
gospel truth and the gentle ministries of Christian 
affection. And if only now and then such ministries 
may be crowned with results as brilliant as in this in- 
stance, in the thousand cases they may be blessed in 
giving to society living stones, fashioned and polished 
for serviceable places in the temple of humanity. 
From the tomb of the illustrious dead let this voice 
come to us, bidding us fulfill our holy mission of 
preaching the gospel to the poor. 

3. There is a voice to all the sons of ambition, 
bidding them clutch lightly the treasures that must 
soon turn to ashes. In the presence of death "what 
shadows we are, and what shadows we pursue " ! If 
death ends all, what a mockery is human greatness — 
nay, what a mockery is human life ! As says a 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 289 

Russian poet of the sum of man's brief and feverish 
existence : 

" Born, living, dying, 
Leaving the still shore for the troubled wave, 
Battling with storm-clouds, over shipwrecks flying, 
And casting anchor in the silent grave." 

When an illustrious military chieftain, v/hose name 
shook the world with terror, was dying, he directed 
that his winding sheet should be fitted on the point of 
a lance and be carried through the streets of the city, 
accompanied with the proclamation : ' ' This is all that 
remains to Saladin the Great of all his glory ! " So 
fades the glory of the world ; and if there be nothing 
beyond " this frail and feverish being of an hour " but 
the winding sheet and the grave — if a glorious man 
such as he whose death we mourn must be compelled 
at last to say to corruption, "Thou art my father," 
and to the worm, "Thou art my mother and my 
sister," then must we say with the wise man of the 
Ancients, "Vanity of vanities, all is vanity." There 
is a value in the labors and in the honors of earth only 
as they educate us for a better life ; and in view of 
that better life the brightest glories and richest prizes 
of earthly ambition are but the toys of childhood, 
which must soon be thrown away as valueless. 

There is a tenderer and a more awful voice that 
speaks to the members of the family — to that sacred 
circle within which the true life and character of our 
departed President was better developed and more 
perfectly known than anywhere else. 

What words can tell the weight of anguish that 
rests upon the hearts of those who so dearly loved 
him and shared with him the sweet sanctities of home 



29O A NOBLE FRIEND OF HUMANITY, 

— the pure love, the gentleness, the kindness and the 
manliness that pervaded all his actions, and made his 
home a charming one for its inmates and lor all that 
shared its hospitalities. It is of all things the saddest 
and most grievous that those bound to him by the 
tenderest ties shall hear that voice of love no more, 
greet him never again in the morning, receive never- 
more at night the benediction of the loving hand that 
rested upon the heads of children, and besought the 
blessing of God upon wife and mother, son and 
daughter. 

The dear old mother who realizes here to-day that 
her four-score years are after all but labor and sorrow, 
to whom we owe, back of all that I have spoken of, 
the education and training that made her son what he 
was, and who has been led from that humble home in 
the wilderness side by side with him in all his eleva- 
tions, has shared with him the honor and the glory 
that came to him step by step, as he mounted up 
from high to higher to receive at last the highest honors 
that the land could bestow upon him; what words 
of comfort can we speak to her ? Left behind him, 
lingering on the shore from which he has passed to 
the other side ; what words can express the sym- 
pathy that is due her, or the consolation that can 
strengthen her heart and give her courage to bear 
this bitter bereavement? May she realize the truth 
of the blessed assurance, "Even to your old age I 
am he ; and even to hoar hairs will I carry you : I 
have made, and I will hear ; even I will carry, and 
will deliver you." 

The wife who began with him in young woman- 
hood, and has bravely kept step with him right 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 2gi 

along, through all his wondrous career, and who has 
been not only his wife, but his friend and his 
counselor through all these successions of prosperity 
and this increase of power, and who, when the day 
of calamity came, was then his ministering angel, 
his prophetess and his priestess, when the circum- 
stances were such as to forbid ministrations from other 
hands, speaking to him the words of cheer which 
sustained him through that long, fearful struggle for 
life, and watching over him when his dying vision 
rested upon her beloved form and sought from her 
eyes an answering gaze that should speak, when words 
could not speak, a love that had never changed, and 
that must now be immortal ; what words of man can 
soothe the anguish of this awful hour? If human 
sympathy can avail, a world in tears comforts her in 
this great sorrow. But there is One whose mission it 
is ' ' to bind up the broken heart, to give beauty for 
ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, and the garment of 
praise for the spirit of heaviness," Who has said, 
* ' When thou passest through the waters, I will be 
with thee, and through the rivers, they shall not over- 
flow thee ; when thou walkest through the fire, thou 
shalt not be burned, neither shalt the flame kindle 
upon thee ; for I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One 
of Israel, thy Saviour." May the God who was the 
trust of her youth and the guide of her womanhood, 
and who has promised to be the Judge of the widow 
and the Father of the fatherless, be her help and her 
refuge in this time of trouble. 

And the children left fatherless in a world like this, 
yet surrounded with a nation's sympathy and a world's 
affections, and able to treasure in their hearts the grand 



292 A NOBLE FRIEND OF HUMANITY, 

lessons of their father's noble and wonderful life, 
may be assured that the eyes of the Nation are upon 
them, and that the hearts of the people go out after 
them. While there is much to support and encour- 
age them, it is still a sad thing, and calls for our 
deepest sympathy, that they have lost such a father, 
and are left to make their way through this rough 
world without his guiding hand or his wise counsels. 
But that which makes this terrible to them now is 
just that which will make very sweet and bright and 
joyous memories to fill all the life of the coming 
years. By the [memories of that love, the loss of 
which they deplore, and by all the loving ties that 
bound them in blessed sympathy in the home circle, 
they will be enabled to live over again a thousand 
times all the sweet life of the past ; though dead, 
their father will still live with them ; though his 
tongue be dumb in the grave, he will speak anew 
to them a thousand beautiful lessons of love and right- 
eousness and truth. 

May God in his infinite mercy fold this stricken 
family in His arms, and bless them as they need in this 
hour of thick darkness, and bear them safely through 
what remains of the troubles and sorrows of the pil- 
grimage unto the everlasting hour, when there shall be 
no more death or crying, neither shall there be any 
more pain ; for the former things shall have forever 
passed away. 

We commit you, beloved friends, to the arms and 
the care of the everlasting Father, whose sweet prom- 
ise goes with us through all the dark and stormy 
paths of life. " I will never leave thee nor forsake 
thee." , 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 293 

I have discharged now the solemn covenant trust 
reposed in me many years ago, growing out of a 
friendship that has never known a cloud, a confidence 
that has never trembled, and a love that has never 
changed. 

Fare thee well, my friend and brother. Thou hast 
fought a good fight ; thou hast finished thy course ; 
thou hast kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up 
for thee a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the 
righteous judge, will give to thee in that day ; and not 
unto thee only, but unto all them also that love his 
appearing. 



OPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE. 

I. Timothy vi. 30. 

The topic assigned to me for discussion is a 
scriptural one. But whether it was meant that I 
should discuss it in its scriptural bearings, I am unable 
to say. Paul, in closing his first letter to Timothy, 
makes this his last admonition: "O Timothy, 
keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding 
profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science 
falsely so called ; which some professing have erred 
concerning the faith." More strictly, it is " antitheses 
of falsely called knowledge." I presume the reference 
to be to the then developing germs of what was after- 
wards known as Gnosticism. The gospel revelation 
was, in a very high sense, knowledge. It was not a 
shadowy philosophy. It was a revelation by Jesus 
Christ of that which he knew concerning God and 
man, heaven and hell, time and eternity. "We 
speak that we do know, and testify of what we have 
seen," was the language of our Lord to Nicodemus. 
And the apostles also testified to what they knew: 
"That which we have heard, which we have seen with 
our eyes, which we have looked upon and our hands 
have handled, of the Word of life ; for the life was 
manifested, and we have seen it and bear witness, and 
show unto you that eternal life which was with the 
Father and was manifested unto us ; that which we 
have seen and heard declare we unto you, that 
ye also may have fellowship with us ; and truly our 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 295 

fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son, Jesus 
Christ." (I. John 1. 1-3). This gospel, therefore, in 
its proclamation, took on the form of fact — things 
done and things known — supported by testimony and 
received by faith into the heart. How much of the 
early triumphs of Christianity was owing to its definite 
and well anthenticated revelation of actual knowledge, 
in a form appreciable by the common mind and meet- 
ing the wants of the common heart, we may not be 
able to estimate. But that it was one great source of 
its power is evident from the attempts of its adver- 
saries to get up an opposing system of knowledge, 
such as would rival its pretensions in this regard. It 
must have had great power with the people when the 
Apostles said : "We have not followed cunningly de- 
vised fables when we made known to you the 
power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were 
eye-witnesses of his majesty." There was also 
knowledge supernaturally communicated. "To an- 
other the word of knowledge, by the same Spirit. *' 
Inspired teachers spoke oracularly of the invisible and 
unknown. Not what they had reasoned out, or what 
they had learned at the feet of philosophers ; not what 
was plausible or probable, though still conjectural ; but 
what God made known through them of eternal truth. 
We find that the enemies of Christ also came forward 
with doctrines which they dignified with the name of 
gnosis or knowledge, and which they attempted to 
arrange into a science of divine things. That strange 
blending of Hellenic and Gentile philosophy under- 
taken by Philo and accredited by the Alexandrian 
school, furnished a basis on which both Jewish and 
Gentile religionists, either in the Christian Church or 



296 OPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE, 

within reach of its influence, built up a conglomerate 
system of Jewish, Greek and Oriental philosophy, and 
Jewish and heathen tradition, which under a pretense ot 
knowledge or science of spiritual things, sought to 
subvert the solid structure of fact and truth which was 
based on the revelations of Jesus Christ and His 
Apostles. The germs of this gnosticism were discern- 
able during the first century. It was this Paul had in 
mind when he told the Collossians to " beware lest any 
man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, 
after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the 
world, and not after Christ." There are traces of a 
similar leaven working in the Corinthian church, which 
led Paul to discourage that kind of knowledge which 
puffeth up, and to inculcate instead that love which 
buildeth up. And I am rather disposed to find an 
allusion to the same thing in his epistle to the Ephe- 
sians when he prays that they may know the love of 
Christ which passeth knowledge — that is which sur- 
passed all the boasted knowledge of the dreamers 
and philosophers and scientists of that time — 
infinitely grander than anything they taught, and 
far above the range of their traditions and reason- 
ings. Their professed knowledge was falsely so 
called. It was a mixture of rabbinical traditions, 
Jewish asceticism, and Gentile philosophy and supersti- 
tion. 

As to the "oppositions of science," we are inclined 
to regard antitheses here as to referring rather to the 
rhetorical art with which this so-called knowledge was 
taught and the dialectic skill with which it was set 
forth. It may also involve an allusion to the dualism 
that characterized their teaching : two gods — one good, 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 297 

the other bad, and the resultant conflict between these 
two divine forces. 

I suppose, however, it was intended in giving me 
this phrase for a text that I should take into account the 
oppositions of modern science, or of some of those who 
profess to teach modern science, to the teaching of the 
Bible. This is a subject that can not be satisfactorily 
treated in a brief essay. I can only point out some of 
these oppositions of science to Scripture teaching, 
and some of its oppositions to its own teaching, and sug- 
gest the lesson to be learned from the facts submitted. 

But first let me say that we shall commit a great 
error if we throw the burden of responsibility for 
the apparent conflicts between religion and science 
entirely on the scientists. All truth is, must be har- 
monious, and there can be no conflict between truth in 
religion and truth in science. But there may be mis- 
conceptions of truth in one and the other, and out of 
these misconceptions grows this conflict. The miscon- 
ceptions are not all on one side. Any one who has 
read Draper's ' ' Conflict between Religion and Science " 
must be aware that while he is himself guilty of mis- 
representations and shows a partiality for almost any- 
thing that he can force into contrast with Christianity, 
to the prejudice of the latter, and while he entirely 
mistakes the character of the Christian religion when 
he makes it identical with the teachings and practices 
of the Roman Catholic Church, he nevertheless arrays 
a host of stinging facts to show that religionists, pro- 
fessedly the champions of Christianity, have set them- 
selves in blind and stubborn and cruel opposi- 
tion to scientific discoveries and scientific truths. 
This is not so disgraceful a fact as scientists would 



298 OPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE. 

have us think. For the truth is that human nature is 
so constituted that it does not readily part with its pos- 
sessions. There are conservative forces and tendencies 
in our very being that will not allow us readily to cast 
off old and cherished friends for the attractions of new 
faces or the high sounding pretensions of new comers. 
Not only in respect to the new in science, but 
equally in respect to the new in every department, 
there is apt to be at first an unwillingness to admit it. 
Thus, when umbrellas first appeared, those who dis- 
played them were chased and hunted down by angry 
crowds. When turnpikes were first made in England, 
there was violent opposition to them. In New 
England, when stoves were first brought into meeting- 
houses, there was bitter opposition to it. The people 
would rather shiver through two long services on the 
coldest winter day than enjoy the comfort of a warm 
atmosphere, simply because it was an innovation. 
Tuning forks, note books, and every other new facility 
for improvement in church music called forth bitter 
hostility. Indeed, it would be an almost endless task 
to enumerate the unreasonable and ridiculous opposi. 
tions to that which could not be reasonably denied to 
be true and beneficial, simply because it was new. 
Not only every new fact in science, but every new 
truth in religion and every announcement of a new 
principle, or a new application to an old principle in 
morals, or in jurisprudence, or in civil government, or 
in political economy, has been fiercely combatted and 
compelled to run the gauntlet of popular prejudices 
and passions before it could win a right to live. And 
scientists themselves have not been far from this same 
severe, unreasoning and persecuting conservatism. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 299 

Nor have they any more right to complain than re- 
ligionists have, or any others who have had a mission 
to herald and advocate innovations. It is not the 
church or religion, but human nature that is at fault ; 
and they ought, instead of complaining, to regard the 
terrible facts with philosophic calmness, and contem- 
plate them, even from their own premises, as parts of 
that evolutionary process by which society is to be 
elevated ultimately, through these preordained and 
inevitable clashings of conservatism and radicalism, to 
a higher and nobler plane. We have, therefore, little 
respect for these everlasting complaints of opposition 
to and persecution of science. 

Religious interests are very sacred. Profane and 
iconoclastic hands can not rudely smite the cherished 
convictions of the soul without raising opposition, 
even in an enlightened age, much less in ages of 
ignorance and superstition. It may be all wrong; but 
to those who regard the whole material and spiritual 
universe as evolved out of nomads or out of fire-mist 
by the inexorable operation of blind forces that just 
whistle themselves without the prompting of any intel- 
ligent power behind them — forces self-generated or 
produced by resistless combinations of unthinking and 
irresponsible matter or mind ; we say to those who thus 
think there should be seen in it neither right nor wrong, 
but simply the inevitable " whatever is, is," and that 
is the beginning and end of it. They ought not to com- 
plain — only on the ground that their complaints are an- 
other part of the same inevitable evolutionary process, 
for which they have not the least responsibility. 

Nor ought they to be too severe on religionists be- 
cause they have misinterpreted the Bible and madly 



300 OPPOSITIONS OP SCIENCE, 

fought for ideas which are not more at war with 
physical science than with the true readings of revela- 
tion. For have not these scientists misinterpreted the 
stone-book and the star-book and the light-book and 
the air-book, and almost every other book in the great 
library of nature ? And have they not been troubled 
over various readings and mistranslations in these 
volumes? And have they not had fierce quarrels 
among themselves, and called each other hard names, 
and given evidence that if the old inquisitorial powers 
were yet in existence, there would be scientific 
martyrs burned at the stake or doomed to pine in 
dungeons, and their hated productions condemned to 
a place in the Index Expurgatorious ? We have no 
reason to believe that scientific popes and inquisitors 
would be an improvement on the religious ones. 

Still, it is a truth that religionists have set them- 
selves against scientific truth, often unreasonably and 
fiercely ; and this has led the votaries of science to 
look upon religion as hostile to them, and because 
this hostility has sometimes been unreasonable, it 
results that every opposition to scientific pretensions is 
regarded as unreasonable, and the only way to preserve 
the good will of scientists and prove to them that you 
are rational, is to "open your mouth and shut your 
eyes " and swallow whatever they give you in the 
name of science. 

On the other hand it is too plain that many pro- 
found scientists are as thorough dogmatists as the 
theologians whom they condemn, and are governed 
in their investigations by a strong desire to array 
science in hostility to religion. The very attempt to 
subject everything in the realms of reason and of 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 301 

faith to materialistic tests, and to condemn as un- 
worthy of confidence everything that can not be 
physically demonstrated is as arrogant a piece of 
dogmatism as was ever known. A true scientific 
spirit will recognize the facts in the realm of spirit as 
readily and as impartially as those in the realm of 
matter, and admit an induction of these facts with as 
severe a love of truth as that which he takes with him 
in his physicial inductions. But this is contemptu- 
ously ignored by a class of investigators who are con- 
cerned to rule mind out of the universe, except as 
an evolution of matter, and all their reasonings in op- 
position to the spiritual and the supernatural are in 
violation of the principles which they profess to re- 
spect. The hostility of this class to religion, and 
especially to the religion of the Bible, is shown — 

1. In their denial of a personal [God. The theory 
of evolution, as suggested by the author of the 
" Vestiges of Creation, " and even as taught by Darwin, 
did not involve such a denial. On the contrary, there 
was a clear admission of the necessity of original 
creative acts, of the production of the primordeal 
forces of life by an almighty and intelligent power. 
They merely denied such a succession of creative acts 
as has generally been asserted. Their position did 
not antagonize theism, but implied it. To create even 
an original form of life and endow it with the capacity 
for the almost infinite variety of life to be developed 
from it, is only to crowd the wonder and grandeur 
of all miracles into one. And if, in that original 
material form, there was made to dwell, according to 
Prof. Tyndall's conception, "the promise and potency 
of every quality of life," intellectual and spiritual, as 



302 OPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE. 

well as physicial — it only adds to the grandeur and 
sublimity of the miracle. But this would not do. 
All creative acts must be got rid of. The Creator 
himself must be ignored. Hence, the determination, 
bold and stubborn, to reach back to a beginning — to 
spontaneous generation, or so near to an original 
starting point that they could say, " Here, as far back 
as we can go, we have found no creator, no miracle. 
If there is anything back of this, it is unknown and 
unknowable. Tracing the developments of life from 
this nomad, we are compelled to the conclusion that 
all the forms of life we see are derived from the inter- 
action of organism and environment through countless 
ages. Beyond this we can know nothing." But still 
the puzzling question returns, Whence the original 
organism and the original environment? And these 
men are compelled to say, "We do not know." 
Huxley says: " Of the causes which have led to the 
organization of living matter, it may be said that we 
know absolutely nothing.'* Well, if they do not 
know, is it anything less than impudent and highly 
offensive dogmatism to deny an original Creator, and 
proceed to build up a system of science, physical, in- 
tellectual and moral, with no God in it ? Let them 
say, We have exhausted the facts of physical science, 
and we have not discovered God. It belongs not to 
physical science to settle that question. If there is a 
God, the original source of life and power, he must be 
found through some other channel than that which we 
have explored. They will thus only confirm what 
Paul wrote eighteen hundred years ago, that "the 
world by wisdom knows not God," and will prove the 
absolute need of just such supernatural revelations of 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 303 

himself as the Bible contains. But let them not found 
an authentic system on their ignorance, and call it 
science. We said this was true of a class of scientists. 
It is only a class. We are glad to quote from the 
lamented Agassiz, as an honored representative of 
quite another class of scientists, who, after exploring 
all the facts and logic of atheistical positivism, and 
after having tried to settle down as a materialist and 
an atheist, was brought at last to a firm and unwaver- 
ing belief in Theism. These words of his, which I am 
about to quote, deserve to be seriously pondered : 
" My method of arriving at the doctrine of the Divine 
Existence is a purely scientific method, and you will 
find, perhaps, before you die, that the ostentatious 
denial or ignoring of God, common among naturalists, 
whom I warmly esteem and whose additions to natural 
history I am the most ready to acknowledge, will end 
in making the science itself sterile. The positive sys- 
tem, under its many names and modifications, will fail 
at last in generating the enthusiasm for new discoveries. 
I fear science will suffer at the hands of its seeming 
devotees. They will become controversialists instead 
of being investigators." That is just what some of 
them have already become. Their knowledge on this 
question is absolute ignorance. It is "science falsely 
so called." 

2. This denial or ignoring of God necessarily in- 
volves the denial of the supernatural, and hence the 
denial of Christianity, which is a system ot super- 
natural facts, and of the Bible, which is largely a record 
of the supernatural. It is not a question of evidence 
so far as Bible miracles are concerned, but a denial of 
the possibility of miracles — a denial that any evidence 



304 OPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE, 

can prove a miracle. So that even were a miracle 
wrought in their presence, they would be compelled 
to ignore their own scientific method in the investiga- 
tion of facts, and dogmatically assert that in spite of 
the evidence of their senses, there was nothing diff- 
erent from the ordinary facts of nature. As a specimen 
of first-class bigotry this is not to be excelled in all the 
history of theological prejudice and ignorance. Yet 
these men know that if there is a God, He must make 
Himself known, if He reveal Himself at all in a super- 
natural way. They have explored all the realms of 
nature, and declare they can not find Him. If He lives 
and would be known, He must reveal Himself in some 
other than a natural way. They can not say He is not. 
They can not say that they do not find Him in nature, 
and if He is ever found it must be through super- 
natural manifestations. Yet when He steps forth in 
answer to this demand, and reveals Himself super- 
naturally, and challenges investigation of the fact of 
His manifestation, these men shut their eyes and ears 
and say, " We will not investigate. There is no such 
thing as the supernatural. If God does not reveal 
Himself in nature, He can not reveal Himself at all, and 
no amount of evidence can convince us. The evidence 
against it must always be stronger than the evidence 
for it." And this is science ! It surely is " science 
falsely so called." 

Let me say now that, in my judgment nothing but 
a stubborn dogmatism could lead men to a conclusion 
so unscientific. There may be much in the miracles of 
the Bible to stagger these men, accustomed as they are 
to studies of a different character, and with environ- 
ments peculiarly unfavorable to a fair appreciation of 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 305 

the evidence of the supernatural. But the ground on 
which they plant themselves is unreasonable in view of 
the facts presented in their own realm of physical 
science. For when they have gone back to the out- 
most verge of physical life, they find in the regular 
processes of nature no beginning of life, no begin- 
ning of matter. They have to confess an utter 
ignorance as to the beginning of things. They can not 
create life. Either their first living organisms were 
created by supernatural power, or the processes they dis- 
cover have been going on eternally. But it can not be 
that they have been going on eternally. As you push 
back into the past you must reach a point where the 
simplest rudimental form of life is found. That must 
have had a beginning, or it must have existed un- 
changed and undeveloped for an eternity back of that. 
If it had a beginning, that beginning was a miracle. If 
it never had a beginning, but existed from all eternity 
in that rude form, then when it began to develop, after 
an eternity of utter inaction, that development was an 
invasion of the order of the universe amounting to a 
miracle. In no way can we get rid of the intervention 
of the supernatural at some point or other. But the 
supernatural once admitted, this whole superstructure 
of atheistic science falls to the ground. 

I have been proceeding thus far on the supposition 
that these scientists have demonstrated the truth of the 
Evolution theory, and have presented an unbroken 
succession of links in a chain of demonstration reaching 
from the first rude forms of life up to man. Even 
were this true, we have seen enough to convince us 
that the oppositions of science to a personal God and 
to His supernatural manifestation are unreasonable. 



306 OPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE, 

What shall be said, then, when it is known that no such 
demonstration has been given — that it is a new theory- 
seeking for facts to sustain it, and confessedly incom- 
plete as a demonstration even by the admission of its 
most enthusiastic advocates. Darwin, it is known, has 
never claimed that the demonstration was complete. 
The spontanous generation, which is an essential part 
of the development hypothesis, is not only not estab- 
lished, but is thus far, in the estimation of such scien- 
tists as Prof. Tyndall, a complete failure. And such 
eminent biologists as Prof. Virchow, of Berlin, are 
free to confess that as yet "all human knowledge is 
but fragmentary. All of us who call ourselves stu- 
dents of nature possess only portions of natural science. 
Every attempt to form our problems into doctrines, to 
introduce our hypotheses as the basis 01 instruction, 
especially the attempt simply to dispossess the church 
and to supplant its dogmas forthwith by a religion 
of evolution— be assured, gentlemen, every such at- 
tempt will make a shipwreck, and in its wreck will also 
bring with it the greatest perils for the whole position 
of science.'' 

3. Finally, we notice the attempt on the part of 
scientists to reduce everything to the level of material- 
ism — a necessary consequence of the evolution theory. 
This is in the highest degree hostile to Christian teaching, 
since it brings mind and morals within the domain of the 
material, and subjects the whole spiritual nature to the 
control of blind forces, thus destroying all account, 
ability, and annihilating all distinction between right 
and wrong. I will not dwell on the dangerous tenden- 
cies and revolting features of this doctrine. I am con- 
cerned with it only as it stands in opposition to Christ- 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES, 2>°7 

tian teaching, and as being only science falsely so called. 
Next to the absurdity of nothing giving birth to some- 
thing, is that of matter giving birth to mind. One 
would think that before any doctrine so contrary to 
all human reason were advanced it would be fortified by 
an invincible array of facts, such as would compel the 
surrender of reason itself to a revelation of higher 
reason. But listen to Prof. Tyndall, who surely has a 
right to know whereof he speaks : 

"Granted that a definite thought and a definite 
molecular action in the brain occur simultaneously, we 
do not possess the intellectual organ, nor apparently any 
rudiment of the organ, which would enable us to pass 
by a process of reasoning from the one to the other." 
He speaks of the chasm between the two classes of 
phenomena being "intellectually impassable." Then, 
as Dr. McCosh observes, " if this be so, the attempt to 
resolve mind into matter has no plausibility whatever." 

And what says Prof. Virchow ? Listen : "I am not 
asserting that it will never be possible to bring psychical 
processes into an immediate connection with physical. 
All I say is, that we have at present no right to set up 
this possible connection as a doctrine of science ; and I 
must enter my decided protest against the attempt to 
make a premature extension of our doctrines in this 
manner, and to be ever anew thrusting into the very 
foreground of our expositions that which has so often 
proved an insoluble problem." 

In the light of these admissions — these avowals of 
the very oracles of physical science — I leave you to 
judge of the charlatanry of science, as witnessed in the 
attempts to subvert the faith of the world in the 
principles that underlie all moral science, by asserting 



308 OPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE, 

as established conclusions in physical science a con- 
nection of mind with matter which has never been 
demonstrated, and in respect to which there yet re. 
mains the same old "impassable chasm" which no 
science of ancient or modern times has been able to 
bridge. Let us say further, before we close, that 
while there is, on one hand, a just demand that theolo- 
gians and religionists shall abandon a dogmatism that 
has been as injurious to religion as to science, and dis- 
miss a bigotry that often holds them to the advocacy 
of exploded errors in regard to Bible interpetration, 
there is at least an equally just and imperative demand 
to be less dogmatic, more modest and more loyal to the 
principles of scientific investigation. The teachings of 
physical science are not so harmonious, its conclusions 
are not so indisputable, its history is not so free from 
error and failure as to warrant the lofty tone of as- 
surance in which its oracles are delivered. As great a 
scientist as Sir Isaac Newton held to the corpuscular 
theory of light, which has since been almost univer- 
sally discarded ; and now the undulatory theory, which 
is generally spoken of with all the confidence of 
demonstration, is seriously called in question. It has 
never been successfully demonstrated. It assumes the 
existence of an ether which has never been proved. 
Such giants as Dr. W. B. Carpenter and Mr. A. R. 
Wallace are hardly out of a fierce contest on certain 
psychological phenomena. Spontaneous generation 
has been and continues to be a bone of contention. 
Even Prof. Tyndall, who once thought he had discover- 
ed spontaneous generation of life, has given it up ; and 
Prof. Huxley, in the Encyclopedia Britannica, now says: 
" Not only is the kind of evidence adduced in favor of 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 



309 



ablogenesis logically insufficient to furnish proof of its 
occurrence, but it may be stated as a well based deduc- 
tion that the more careful the investigator and the 
more complete his mastery over the endless practical 
difficulties which surround experimentation on this 
subject, the more certain are his experiments to give a 
negative result, while positive results are no less sure 
to crown the efforts of the clumsy and careless. The 
fact is that at the present moment there is not a 
shadow of trustworthy direct evidence that ablogenesis 
does take place or has taken place within the period 
during which the existence of life on the globe is re- 
corded." 

Quoting for a moment the words of another (D. W. 
Rhodes): "The results of science are, in no sense of 
the word, to be relied on as final results. What it 
declares to be certain to-day it had not reached yester- 
day, and will doubt to-morrow. The history of scien- 
tific thought has been in the nature of things one of 
constant change, of climbing where each rung of the 
ladder had been in turn excitingly grasped and quietly 
abandoned. But there is no more reason to believe 
that the present positions of scientific thought will be 
permanent than there has been in the past. She 
speaks no more confidently now than she has spoken a 
hundred times before upon propositions which she has 
abandoned. So rapidly has she changed her utterances 
that at times the second edition of a work has contra- 
dicted the first. It is not remarkable that it should be 
so, but it destroys all claim to absolute reliability in 
any theory now made upon the same kind of evidence 
which then misled her. Compare her utterances as to 
anatomy. Galen, Vesalius, Harvey, Carpenter have 



310 OPPOSITIONS OF SCIENCE, 

each in turn announced his predecessor to be in error 
in the fundamentals of his science. And yet each 
represented, in his day, the highest development of 
the knowledge in that branch of physical science. 
May not a day come when the present leaders of 
thought in anatomy shall be regarded with the same 
compassion that is now extended to Vesalius and his 
theory as to the blood. Is there not room in this 
great science for as much advance in knowledge as that 
which separates the crude theories of Galen from the 
theories of to-day ? If this science, then, should ar- 
rogantly declare that it has overthrown in any way the 
statements of a revelation which has a prescriptive lien 
upon our trust, it is enough to say, your system, not 
being self evident, nor a demonstration, nor by your 
own confession final and certain, may be in fundamen- 
tal points opposed to facts which science shall yet un- 
veil." 

Even the doctrine concerning our earth and the 
other planets of the solar system, that they rotate 
upon their axes and move around the sun — a doctrine 
which is now regarded as completely settled as any 
doctrine of inspiration — is now seriously called in 
question. I am not referring to the Rev. Jasper, of 
Richmond, Va., but to Dr. Shaeffer, of Boston, whose 
lecture has been published in the Scientific American. 
Within a few years several of the scientists of Great 
Britain, such as Tate and Thompson, had a furious dis- 
cussion on the age of our globe, and there was only 
the difference of a few hundred millions of years be- 
tween them. 

Surely it becomes scientists to be modest and come 
to settled conclusions in some of these smaller matters, 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 311 

before they ambitiously undertake the tremendous task 
of evolving the whole universe out of fire-mist, and 
thrusting God out of an infinite domain, undertake to 
hitch — not a wagon to a star, but all the stars to the 
wagon of atheistic materialism, and drag down every- 
thing spiritual and heavenly to a base material level. 

In all this, I confess, I do not see anything that 
bears specially on Sunday-school interests, but that is 
not my fault. Not to leave it entirely disconnected 
from these interests, allow me in conclusion to say that 
Paul gave a warning concerning those who were captured 
by these oppositions of science, that they " erred con- 
cerning the faith." Literally, they had "missed the 
mark." It is a grievous thing to find, after a life of 
anxiety and research, that we have missed the mark, 
and made life a failure. It ought to make us scrupu- 
lously careful as to the principles we adopt, and 
especially as to where they will land us. Any one 
who has read the autobiography of John Stuart Mill, 
or caught the sad and hopeless notes of the closing ut- 
terances of Strauss, can not but feel a deep sadness at 
the thought that these mighty natures, after all their 
predigious labors, were at last bereft of the assurance 
that they had hit the mark. For anything that science 
yet indicates to the contrary, he is safe who holds on 
to the faith of Jesus and shapes his life according to His 
teachings. And the best thing to be done for the 
young to enable them to hit the mark, is to teach them 
to love and practice the precepts of Him who, amid all 
mutations and all oppositions, still remains the stead- 
fast hope of the ages—" Jesus Christ, the same yester- 
day, to-day, and forever." 



FIFTY-NINE YEARS OF HISTORY. 

An Address Delivered at the Annual Meeting op 
the Ohio Christian Missionary Society, 
New Lisbon, May 19, 1886. 

On the 1 8th of next November it will be fifty-nine 
years since Walter Scott, in this town, publicly intro- 
duced a religious reformation which has very seriously 
influenced the theological and ecclesiastical develop- 
ments of the last half century — especially in the West 
— and has won for itself a place in the religious move- 
ments of the age. To understand and appreciate this 
reformatory movement, we must know something of 
the condition of affairs, theologically and ecclesiastic- 
ally, at the date mentioned, especially in this region, 
and generally through the West. 

I. Calvinism, as doctrinally set forth in the West- 
minister Confession of Faith, was the popular religious 
faith, especially among the Scotch-Irish who so largely 
peopled Western Pennsylvania, whose influence radi- 
ated thence to Ohio and portions of what is now West 
Virginia ; among the New Englanders who settled in 
the Western Reserve ; and among the Baptists, with 
whom the Philadelphia Confession of Faith was, at 
that time, the acknowledged standard of doctrine. In 
this severely logical system, from the premises of the 
total depravity of human nature, and of personal, un- 
conditional election and reprobation, it was impossible 
to avoid the conclusion that regeneration is a miracle, 

3" 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 313 

dependent solely on the will of God, the subject being 
entirely passive, and the result being as truly miracu- 
lous as the resurrection of Lazarus from the dead. No 
preaching, no teaching, no pleading, no prayers, could 
have the least possible effect in the regeneration of a 
sinner, except as it pleased God to accompany them 
with a supernatural creative power, literally creating a 
new being. This led some, notably among the preach- 
ers in the Redstone Baptist Association, to decline to 
preach the gospel to sinners — even to their children — 
or to do anything to forward their conversion. They 
took the ground that regeneration was God's work ex- 
clusively, and that when Jesus said, "Go ye into all 
the world, and preach the gospel to every creature," 
he meant every new creature — the old being beyond the 
reach of all human means and agencies. [A voice in 
the audience: "I have heard that many a time."] 
This doctrine made regeneration a fearfully uncertain 
thing to the sinner, and, so far as anything on his part 
was concerned, an absolutely impossible thing. 

2. Regeneration being thus a miracle, its accom- 
plishment in any case was expected to have extraordi- 
nary accompaniments. It was realized after long, des- 
perate, heart-breaking struggles. Some passage of 
Scripture, such as "Thy sins are all forgiven thee,'' 
was supernaturally suggested, or heard in the air, and 
had all the force of a new and direct revelation ; or 
there were dreams, or visions, or sounds in the air, or 
trances, or other preternatural phenomena, to attest 
the fact of acceptance with God. And in this, those 
who were known as Armenians exceeded even the Cal- 
vinists in the number and variety of supernatural or 
preternatural accompaniments of conversion. The 



314 FIFTY-NINE YEARS OF HISTORY, 

gospel was not a proclamation of amnesty under which 
the whole rebellious world could come in and secure 
pardon by compliance with the prescribed conditions 
of reconciliation ; each case of regeneration and con- 
version was rather the result of a special act of Divine 
sovereignty accompanied with special Divine manifes- 
tations ; and they who sought in vain for these special 
manifestations were left to go mourning all their days. 

3. Closely akin to this — indeed, its logical concomi- 
tant — was the doctrine that the word of God is a dead 
letter, utterly powerless to convince or persuade until 
specially vivified and applied by the Holy Spirit. It 
was, indeed, acknowledged that the word of God is 
"the sword of the Spirit," but it was such, not be- 
cause the Spirit made it, to be wielded by the Christian 
soldier, but because the Spirit himself wielded it to 
conquer the sinner's enmity and subdue him to the 
authority of Christ. It may be incredible to many 
when I state that it was not uncommon to hear men 
say that they would as soon depend on an old almanac 
for conversion as on the Bible ; yet it is true that such 
expressions were often heard. [A voice in the au- 
dience: " I've heard that, too."' While the Bible was 
devoutly read as an act of piety, and while it was a 
store-house of texts for preachers, it was not expected 
to be of any benefit except as the Spirit should 
specially illuminate it and apply it. 

4. The Bible Avas therefore a sealed book. It was 
not to be studied, like any other book in human lan- 
guage, subject to the well established laws of interpre- 
tation. It had no well defined character as a progres- 
sive revelation of the plans and purposes of Jehovah. 
The successive dispensations of religion— Patriarchal, 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 315 

Jewish, Christian — were all confused, and the reader, 
if inquiring what he must do to be saved, was as likely 
to seek for an answer in Kings, or Chronicles, or Ruth, 
or the Songs of Solomon, as in Acts of Apos- 
tles. We do not mean to say that theological writers 
made no discrimination between the Law and the Gospel 
— for this would be far from true, although their dis- 
criminations did not amount to much when they could 
find the Church of Christ in the Garden of Eden, in 
the family of Abraham, and in the Jewish nation, and 
authority for the divine order of the clergy in the 
Levitical priesthood ; but we are speaking of the state 
of mind among the people at large in the religious 
communities at that time, and we are recording the 
simple truth when we say that the Bible, so far from 
being a luminous revelation of the will of God, was a 
sealed book to the multitude. They did not under- 
stand it — they did not expect to understand it. 

5. This will be better understood when we state 
that the clergy were regarded as having the key of 
knowledge, and the people were dependent on them 
for a knowledge of the meaning of Scripture. Not 
merely that they had learning, and leisure to make the 
Scriptures their special study, and were therefore 
capable of instructing others ; but that they were called 
of God, as was Aaron ; were divinely appointed, like 
the Levites and the Priests, to this task, and were 
erected into a special order, as the special expounders 
of the word of God. To question their teaching was, 
if not arrogant and impious, at least very daring and 
presumptuous. What could an untaught layman be 
expected to know, in the presence of an educated and 
ordained clergyman ? These clerical leaders might dis- 



3l6 FIFTY-NINE YEARS OF HISTORY, 

pute among themselves as to the meaning of Scripture, 
for they were supposed to stand on a common level of 
official dignity and authority ; but woe betide the pre- 
sumptuous layman who dared to utter what he had 
learned from a devout and patient study of the Word of 
God. The clergy had an exclusive right to preach and 
teach, and to administer the sacraments ; and only as 
subordinates could the most saintly of laymen — such as 
the Ruling Elders in some of the churches — have any 
part or lot in these matters. The universal priesthood 
of Christians, though it might be sometimes theoreti- 
cally admitted, was practically ignored. It was not 
merely a selection from among the "royal priests," 
who constituted "the house of God, " of those whose 
gifts and acquirements fitted them to rule and to teach 
— for this, as a matter of order and practical wisdom, 
is scriptural and just; but it was the recognition of an 
order of men specially called of Gcd to this work, and 
by virtue of their divine call ordained and empowered 
to preach and teach and rule with divine authority. 

6. The common version of the English Scriptures 
was regarded with such a superstitious reverence that 
any suggestion of a new and better translation was re- 
garded as little better than impious. 

7. Human creeds were of binding authority. They 
were tests of fellowship. There could be no admit- 
tance to church membership except by subscription to 
the creed of the Church, even though it were as 
cumbrous, as difficult to be understood, as dogmatic in 
its teaching on abstruse doctrines and speculative 
theology as the Westminister Confession of Faith. 
The Baptist Associations had creeds, and sometimes 
each church in the Association had a creed of its own ; 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 317 

but these generally referred to the Philadelphia Con- 
fession as the Baptist fountain of creed authority. 

8. It is scarcely necessary to say, in view of the 
facts already submitted, that sectarianism was rampant. 
Christian union was ridiculed as alike impracticable 
and undesirable. Sectarianism was normal and healthy 
— nay, essential to the purity and prosperity of the 
church. But the result was envy, rivalry, bitter and 
disgraceful strife, and as the Scriptures declare, " Where 
jealousy and faction are, there is confusion and every vile 
deed" ( Jas. iii. 16). It is not to be wondered at that, 
notwithstanding special seasons of revival, when spirit- 
ual emotion would break forth violently and overleap 
all these obstructions, the general state of religion was 
marked by a barrenness and feebleness which all pious 
souls deplored. 

It was at such a time, and in the midst of such a 
condition of spiritual affairs, that Walter Scott made 
his appearance with what he styled a new " advocacy" 
of the Gospel. This "advocacy" was not the off- 
spring of a day. It was not the hot impulse of enthu- 
siasm — the lawless fancy of a religious crank. It was 
the result of patient and devout study of the Bible, and 
the ripe fruitage of teachings in various quarters through 
the preceding part of the century. 

First of all, let it be observed that all that Walter 
Scott taught had been already set forth in nearly all 
the evangelical creeds. All that he affirmed concern- 
ing the Christ, all that he insisted on concerning bap- 
tism for the remission of sins, is to be found in all the 
orthodox creeds of Christendom, with the exception 
that the Baptist creeds do not harmonize with the 
others as to the design of baptism. Some of these 



31 8 FIFTY-NINE YEARS OF HISTORY, 

orthodox creeds even go so far as to teach baptismal 
regeneration— an extreme to which Mr. Scott and those 
associated with him never went. 

Not to speak ot the movements, at the beginning 
of the century, of 0' Kelly and others in the East, and 
of Barton W. Stone and others in the West — move- 
ments with which Walter Scott did not come in contact 
— we remark that through George Forrester, of Pitts- 
burg, Scott came under a class of reformatory influen- 
ces that had been at work for many years at various 
points in Great Britain and Ireland, and also in this 
country, through which he had been led into a 
thorough study of the Scriptures. In 1818, "the 
church professing obedience to the faith of Jesus 
Christ, assembling together in New York," sent forth a 
circular letter "to the churches of Christ scattered 
over the earth to whom this communication may come." 
This, with the answers received, and a Reply and an 
Appendix written by my father, Henry Errett, was 
published in 1820, in a small volume, which arrested 
the attention of Walter Scott. In the New York cir- 
cular, the admission of candidates to baptism on the 
simple voluntary confession of their faith in Jesus the 
Christ, is stated. In the Appendix, the teaching of 
the New Testament concerning baptism for remission 
of sins is fully set forth, although there was an evident 
hesitation to accept this teaching in its literal import. 
Walter Scott was led by this publication to visit the 
church in New York, and spent several months there. 
William Baxter, in his life of Walter Scott (pp. 53, 54), 
says: "The result of his visit, however, was a sad 
disappointment ; he found the practice of the church 
far in the rear of what he had been led to expect from 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 319 

the publication which had led him to seek a more 
intimate acquaintance ; nor did there seem to be any 
disposition on their part to fall in with his views, 
which began to look in the direction of a radical 
reform." A regard to the truth of history requires me 
to supplement this with a statement which probably I 
alone am competent to make. When New Libson was 
my home (1844-49), m Y ^ rs ^ meeting here with 
Walter Scott was peculiarly interesting. He had spent 
much time at my father's house in New York, when I 
was a babe, and where, as he told me, I was often 
dandled on his knee. He listened to Henry Errett, 
one of the elders of the church, in a series of lectures 
on the four Gospels. Now, he found me engaged in 
the service of the first church he had called away from 
human creeds to the apostolic platform, in the town 
where he had first publicly proclaimed baptism for the 
remission of sins. We were naturally led into much 
conversation about New York and New Lisbon, as we 
both stood related to them. He was rapturous in his 
commendation of that course of lectures on the Gos- 
pels, and told me that his first clear conception of bap- 
tism for remission of sins was obtained from that little 
book issued by the church in New York, and that his 
first clear conception of the Divinity of Christ as the 
central truth of Christianity he obtained in listening to 
that course of lecturers in the New York church. He 
repeated all this to me the last time I saw him, at 
Mayslick, Ky. , a short time before his death. In the 
light of these facts we can better understand what Wm. 
Baxter says (p. 60): "It was not long after Mr. 
Scott's return from New York, in 1821, that his mind 
became possessed by what proved to be the great 



320 FIFTY-NINE YEARS OF HISTORY, 

thought of his life, namely : that Jesus is the Christ, 
the Son of the living God ; a proposition around which, 
in his esteem, all other truths revolved as planets 
around the sun." Out of this new line of investiga- 
tion came those remarkable essays of Scott's " On 
Teaching Christianity," over the signature of " Philip," 
in the first volume of the Christian Baptist. In my 
humble judgment, the most thoroughly revolutionary 
element in Walter Scott's advocacy of reformation, 
and that which has proved most far-reaching in its 
influence, is just this concerning the central truth of 
Christianity. It not only shaped all his preaching, but 
it shaped the preaching and practice of the reformers 
generally, and called the attention of the religious 
world at large to the fact that a person, and not a system 
of doctrines, is the proper object of faith ; and that 
faith in Jesus, love for Jesus, and obedience to Jesus, 
is the grand distinction of Christianity. While it is 
true that there was much in the condition of the church 
in New York that was unpleasant and disheartening to 
Walter Scott, let us not refuse to it, and to the church 
in Pittsburg, Pa., under the care of George Forrester, 
the honor of forming connecting links in the chain of 
influences that led on to the wonderful work of Scott 
and his associates in the reproclamation of the original 
gospel. 

How new to the people was this teaching concern- 
ing Christ as the personal object of saving faith, may 
be to some extent imagined when I state that even to 
this day it is regarded as a novelty. Here [holding up 
a pamphlet] is a recent publication from the press of 
Phillips & Hunt, New York, entitled, ' Critique on 
'Thoughts on the Holy Gospels,' by the late Benjamin 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 32 1 

N. Martin, D. D., LL. D., Professor of Logic and 
Philosophy in the University of the City of New York ; 
with Letters, and Notices from Other Books, by Francis 
W. Upham." In this "Critique," Dr. Martin says 
that " the view of the nature and design of the Gos- 
pels is, so far as we know, entirely original with Dr. 
Upham. . . . Before a conception so clear and 
definite, and so far-reaching, common infidel objections 
disappear ; they require no further answer." And 
what, pray, is this " entirely original view of the Gos- 
pels " ? It is all condensed into a single sentence: 
" The Gospels were not designed as biographies ; they 
are arguments to prove that Jesus is the Son of God." 
Dr. Martin is not aware that hundreds of thousands 
have, within the last half century, studied the Gospels 
from this point of view, and that this was one of the 
most distinctive features of the teaching of Alexander 
Campbell and Walter Scott sixty years ago. 

We call attention to these facts not to raise the 
question as to who was first to restore this or that for- 
gotten or neglected truth — for in place of any such 
boasting it should be to all a cause of humiliation that 
they had not sooner learned the simple truth as taught 
in the New Testament — but to show that what Walter 
Scott first publicly announced here nearly sixty years 
ago had been gradually developed, slowly learned, and 
abundantly confirmed as true, before it was proclaimed. 

Then there was his acquaintanceship with the 
Campbells, who had been for many years groping their 
way into the light, and who were eminently helpful to 
him in his search for the primitive landmarks. They and 
he fully accorded as to the central truth of the gospel, 
and the necessity of calling men away from faith in 



322 FIFTY NINE YEARS OF HISTORY, 

human creeds and systems of doctrine, to faith in the 
Divine Saviour and instant submission to the authority 
of the Son of God. They saw alike, too, in regard to 
the place occupied by baptism in the original gospel ; 
and as early as 1823 Alexander Campbell, in his debate 
with W. L. McCalla, had stated his views concerning 
baptism for remission of sins, and wherever the 
Christian Baptist had circulated, its expositions of New 
Testament teaching had led many to a new estimate of 
the importance of baptism. Jacob Osborne, Adamson 
Bentley, and many more, had, by a careful study of the 
New Testament, reached the conclusion that baptism, 
to the believing penitent, is for the remission of sins. 
It is evident, therefore, that not by any sudden 
impulse of enthusiasm did Walter Scott leap into a 
position that could not be sustained by sober reason and 
Scripture testimonies; but his public preaching was 
the result of patient, anxious, long-continued investi- 
gation, by which he had reached a conclusion which he 
was prepared not only to avow, but to maintain and 
defend against all opposition. And there is this to be 
said, in justice to his memory ; that while others, as 
well as he, saw the truth, and that it was when stand- 
ing on their shoulders that he gained a wider vision 
and grasped a bolder conception of gospel teaching, 
he was the first to announce publicly the Divinity and 
Christhood of Jesus as the one article of faith in the 
genuine Apostles' Creed ; and to ask of those who had 
this faith an instant surrender to the authority of Jesus 
by being baptized in his name for the remission of 
sins. Ke boldly projected apostolic teaching and 
practice into public view, and compelled attention to 
them. There is a cautious, timid, conservative, milk- 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 323 

and-water style of writing and preaching about certain 
truths, half-concealing and half-revealing them, that 
never amounts to much. You must project a truth or 
duty into distinctness, place it four-square to all the 
winds that blow, thunder it in the ears of the people, 
wage an aggressive warfare in its behalf, and stand 
ready to live for it, and die for it, if need be, if you 
would succeed in riveting public attention, and winning 
the hearts of men to it. This is just what Walter 
Scott did ; and for this he deserves to be held in ever- 
lasting remembrance. Not only did he boldly pro- 
claim the truth, but with peculiar tact, with wonderful 
power of analysis and classification, and with superior 
eloquence and oratory, he expounded and vindicated 
it, illustrating and enforcing it with a marvelous sim- 
plicity, and yet a richness of learning, a fervor of spirit, 
and an eccentricity of genius, that compelled attention 
to his advocacy and won thousands into submission to 
Christ. All this, to us now, seems easy and delight- 
ful ; but at that time, and under those circumstances, it 
was difficult, daring and heroic in the highest degree. 
Such was the excitement over it, and such the extrava- 
gant rumors concerning it, that even Bethany took the 
alarm, and the venerable Thomas Campbell came over 
here, as Barnabas went from Jerusalem to Antioch, to 
inquire into these proceedings. This grand old man, 
like Barnabas, "when he came, and had seen the 
grace of God, was glad, and exhorted them all that 
with purpose of heart they would cleave unto the 
Lord. . . And much people was added unto the 
Lord " (Acts xi. 22-24). 

The strange work once initiated, it progressed 
rapidly and with wonderful power. The vigorous pen 



324 FIFTY-NINE YEARS OF HISTORY, 

of Alexander Campbell supplied for the Christian 
Baptist, in 1828, a series of essays on Baptism, of re- 
markable clearness aud emphasis. Bentley, and Os- 
borne, and Joseph Gaston, and Secrest and Mitchell 
came to the rescue, and soon a new generation of 
preachers — the Haydens, Henry, Hartzel, Moss, the 
Bosworths, Rudolphs, Hubbard, Allerton, Finch, 
Schaeffer, Williams, Collins, sprang to arms, under the 
inspiration of Scott's teaching, and there was a general 
religious awakening throughout all this region. Thou- 
sands were turned to the Lord, and many churches 
were planted, simply as churches of Christ, to be 
governed solely by the teaching of Christ Jesus and his 
apostles ; and many churches that had been known as 
Baptist dropped their creeds and their denominational 
distinctions, and joined heartily in the work of restoring 
fully the apostolic method of preaching the gospel and 
the apostolic basis of Christian fellowship. 

Our limits will not allow us to speak of the years 
in which Scott had previously labored in the service of 
the Mahoning Association, nor to enter into the details 
of the first reformatory movement in New Lisbon ; nor 
is it necessary so to do, for the facts are, I presume, 
familiar to most of you. 

It is now fifty-nine years since that first bold, yet 
trembling and anxious movement in New Lisbon. 
What has been the result of this and confluent move- 
ments in behalf of a return to the faith and practice of 
apostolic times ? / 

Then it was a question of argument ; now it is a 
question of fruitage. Has the tree of reformation 
borne good fruit ? Are its ivorks such as to commend 
it to every man's conscience in the sight of God ? 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 325 

These are grave questions, and deserve a candid an- 
swer. Let us say, then : 

1. The New York Observer of April 22, 1886, in a 
statistical table of the various denominations, puts us 
down as numbering, in the United States, 617,800 
communicants, 4,950 churches, and 2,604 ministers, 
being the fifth in rank, in point of numbers, among the 
Protestant bodies in this country. The annual increase 
in our membership, of late years, ranges from 30,000 
to 50,000. Although it was a frequent prediction that 
when Scott and the Campbells died our churches would 
soon be disintegrated, and the whole movement be 
numbered with the things of the past, since no church 
could be permanent without a human creed, the truth 
is that our enlargement has been more rapid since they 
passed away than before. There are also numerous 
churches in England, in Australia and New Zealand. 

2. In this State we have a Missionary Society 
established in 1852, which, without including the re- 
sults of the year just closing, reports sermons 
preached, 60,078; number of days' service, 64,327; 
number of additions, 23,398 ; churches organized, 173; 
money expended, $282,988.75 ; moneys invested, $19,- 
200; young men helped to prepare for the ministry, 
30. The number of churches now in the State is 430; 
of communicants, 40,700; pupils in Sunday-schools, 
25,600; number of preachers, 220. 

We have, besides numerous State Missionary 
Societies. 

3. A General Christian Missionary Convention, es- 
tablished in 1849. The aggregate receipts of this 
Convention, up to October, 1885, were $239,848.56, 
while the amount raised by missionaries in the field 



326 FIFTY-NINE YEARS OF HISTORY, 

swells it to $500,000. The number of baptisms, 19,- 
871, while the accessions, including scattered disciples 
gathered together, make the whole about 45,000. 
Last year shows the number of preachers employed, 
whole or part of the time, 31; baptisms, 596; other 
accessions, 828 ; new points visited, 74 ; churches 
planted, 21 ; receipts for all purposes, $22,155.26. 

A Foreign Missionary Society, which within less 
than eleven years reports : whole number of converts, 
2,699; number of missionaries now in the field, 33; 
number of mission stations, between 20 and 30 ; whole 
amount contributed, $198,088.53. There are missions 
in England, Denmark, France, Turkey, Japan and 
China. 

A Christian Woman's Board of Missions, which has 
been in operation over eleven years, which has in 
Jamaica 14 churches, 6 schools, 6 preachers and several 
teachers. Besides this, the Board supports four mis- 
sionaries in India, assists in sustaining the work in 
Japan, and sustains several home missions in Western 
States and Territories. 

There are some twenty-six State Missionary 
organizations, and six Sunday-school State Conven- 
tions, with Sunday-school evangelists in their employ. 

We have 2 orphan-schools; 42 schools, colleges and 
universities ; I Widows' and Orphans' Home ; we pub- 
lish I quarterly magazine, 8 monthlies, 14 weeklies, 
besides 1 1 Sunday-school papers, Bible Lessons, etc. ; 
while of books and tracts the number is considerable, 
although we are unable to furnish accurate statistics. 

In all this we have spoken only of our own country ; 
were we to take Canada, England, Australia, and our 
foreign missions, we should add about 30,000 to our 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 327 

membership. At the same time it must remembered 
that we have no statistics of the cost of church build- 
ings and of other large outlays incident to a new and 
properous movement. 

This, we are aware, is nothing to boast of. It is far 
below what we are capable of. Yet, as the work of 
little more than half a century, amidst the embarrass- 
ments of poverty, and the extraordinary expenditures 
attendant on the beginning of such a movement, and 
the drawbacks arising from the great variety of opinions 
and of prejudices among people gathered out of all 
sects, as well as from the world, we think it will be re- 
garded by candid minds as a remarkable and highly 
encouraging sixty years' history. 



It is worth while to inquire into the changes that 
have taken place during this period in the religious 
communities around us. 

1. While the doctrines of Calvinism and Arminian- 
ism remain the same in the creeds, they are not the 
same in the fiulpzt. Very little of the old style of Cal- 
vinistic teaching is now heard, and suggestions are fre- 
quent, both in the old world and the new, in favor of a 
revision of the Calvinistic creeds. 

2. Creed authority has been greatly diminished. 
Except in the Lutheran Church, we know of none of 
the orthodox churches that now require subscription 
to a human creed as necessary to admission to the 
church. The Episcopalians, indeed, insist on the so- 
called Apostles' Creed — which is but one of the earliest 
human creeds ; but as this is, in the main, a statement 
of gospel facts, and not of human speculations, it 
would be unfair to class it with the human creeds of 



328 FIFTY NINE YEARS OF HISTORY, 

which we speak. On the contrary, all who believe on 
the Lord Jesus Christ, and repent of their sins, are, in 
view of such faith and repentance, accepted and 
welcomed. They do not, generally, publicly invite 
believing penitents to come forward and confess faith in 
Christ, as we do ; they still deem it necessary to ques- 
tion the candidates as to their religious experience ; 
but it is to learn, not their acceptance of the creed of 
the church, but their acceptance of Christ as their 
Saviour. Even as it relates to candidates for the 
ministry, there is not generally that rigid insistence 
on a conformity to the teaching of the creeds, that be- 
longed to former times. 

3. The Bible is much more a living word than it 
used to be. The work of the Bible Societies and of 
the Missionary Societies has done much to turn men 
away from the old theories of regeneration and con- 
version, and has taught them to rely on the word of 
God and the preaching of the gospel as the divinely 
appointed means to bring men to repentance. The 
preaching of such men as Mr. Moody has done and is 
doing much to teach sinners to seek the evidence of 
pardon in the promises made in the gospel to those 
who believe in and submit to the Lord Jesus. And 
the International Sunday-school lessons are leading to 
a general study of the whole counsel of God as re- 
vealed in the Scriptures. 

4. The popular prejudice against new translations 
of the Scriptures has so far given away that we have 
now a revised version of the Scriptures, undertaken by 
eminent men in the Church of England, and heartily 
seconded by eminent scholars of various denominations 
in England and America. The growth of the science 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 329 

of Biblical criticism has been great, leading continually 
to a more enlightened study and interpretation of the 
word of God. 

5. The evils of sectarianism and the desirableness 
of Christian union are now generally acknowledged, 
and year by year the sentiment in favor of union is 
growing and extending. There is much more free and 
frank discussion of differences, with a view to reach a 
common basis of fellowship, and there is much more 
general and hearty co-operation in all general enter- 
prises in which all parties may freely unite. The 
American Congress of Churches, in which all ques- 
tions bearing on Christian unity and union are freely 
and fearlessly discussed, reveals the trend of public 
sentiment on this question. 

6. The clerical element, while not less potent, is 
less exclusive and less authoritative than formerly, 
while the lay element is now largely recognized and 
utilized. The Young Men's Christian Associations 
were really an uprising against the exclusiveness and 
oppression of the clerical order. The common priest- 
hood of all Christians is now generally admitted, even 
high dignitaries in the Church of England boldly avow- 
ing it. Not only lay men but lay women are now wel- 
comed to active and responsible church work, and are 
making their power felt all over the land and over the 
world. 

7. The central truth of Christianity — the Divinity 
and Christhood of Jesus — this divine person as the ob- 
ject of faith, and love for and obedience to Him as the 
bond of Christian fellowship — is taking hold of the 
best minds of all parties, and is quietly working a rev- 
olution in doctrinal Christianity. 



330 FIFTY-NINE YEARS OF HISTORY, 

I am far from implying that all this has been 
wrought out through this reformatory movement. It 
is the normal development, under providential guid. 
ance, of the principles that all orthodox Protestants 
acknowledge. But that the teaching of the Campbells, 
and Scott, and their coadjutors, has influentially con- 
tributed to these results, there can be no doubt. But 
no difference how these changes have been wrought, 
let us rejoice that they have been wrought, with en- 
couraging promise that in the end the reign of specu- 
lative theology and of sectarianism will cease, and that 
all lovers of Jesus will yet flow together in brotherly 
love, acknowledging "one Lord," teaching "one 
faith," practicing "one baptism," uniting in "one 
body," sharing the fellowship of " one Spirit," rejoic- 
ing in ' ' one hope, " and serving with joy the " one God 
and Father of all," who will be over all, and through 
all, and in all. If we had no higher reason to rejoice 
in these changes, it should give us joy that the teach- 
ing of our fathers, sixty and seventy years ago, then so 
bitterly opposed, and ridiculed, and misrepresented, is 
thus confirmed and approved by the general voice of 
Protestant Christendom. 



And now, let us ask, what are the special achieve- 
ments yet to be wrought, to which we should address 
our thought and labor? 

I. While marked changes have been wrought in 
the evangelical churches generally, there is still much 
to be done to effect a complete restoration of apostolic 
faith and practice. Creed authority, though weakened, 
is still potent. Denominational names and creeds and 
usages are still a source of weakness to the Protestant 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 33 I 

churches, and of sectarianism it may be said : It is not 
dead, but sleepeth. The old ideas of regeneration and 
conversion and of an immediate revelation of pardon 
are still so far in force, and so far shape the converting 
processes in revivals, that we can not participate in 
them, for we are not at liberty to tell anxious sinners 
just what the apostles said they must do to be saved. 
There is still a necessity to insist on a return to New 
Testament practice, namely : to preach Christ crucified 
as the sinner's Saviour; to lead men to "repentance 
toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ; " 
to demand of believing penitents an open surrender to 
Christ by being immersed in His name ; and to point 
those who thus accept the gospel to the promises which 
God has made in the gospel to the believing and obe- 
dient as the evidence of acceptance in His sight. The 
faithful preaching of the gospel in its entirety of facts, 
commands and promises, is as needful now as it ever 
was. On the whole question of baptism — action, sub- 
jects and design — we have still a serious controversy 
with the pedobaptist world, and in reference to its de- 
sign, with the Baptists likewise. There can be no sur- 
render here — no compromise. I am well aware of the 
popular clamor in behalf of liberality and charity; but 
to all this we reply : Be as liberal as you please with 
what is your own, but be careful how you attempt to 
give away what is not yours, but God's. There is no 
opinion, no mere usage, however tenderly regarded, 
no expedient — nothing, indeed, that is human, which 
we may not and ought not to surrender, if need be, for 
the sake of the union of Christians ; but we can not 
yield God's commands, or the truth of the gospel, for 
these are divine. We shall be shorn of our strength 



332 FIFTY-NINE YEARS OF HISTORY, 

when we allow ourselves to be lulled to sleep in the lap 
of this Delilah of compromise. Look at the old Chris- 
tian Connection. They are older, as a distinct people, 
than we, by more than a quarter of a century. And 
they have been so charitable as to allow all who would 
to come into their fellowship without regard to bap- 
tism. Yet to-day they number only about one hun- 
dred thousand, while we number between six hundred 
thousand and seven hundred thousand. Look at the 
Free Baptists. Baptism has been with them of little 
significance. They had much the start of us — about 
half a century. But to-day they number less than one 
hundred thousand. Look at T. H. Stockton's experi- 
ment in Cincinnati. He was one of the finest and 
most popular pulpit orators in America. He sought 
to set on foot a union movement in which baptism was 
placed in the background as not of sufficient import- 
ance to be allowed to interfere with the union of be- 
lievers ; but with all his saintliness, eloquence, and 
popularity, his scheme was a failure. And so was the 
union scheme of McCune and Melish a few years ago. 
The ends of truth are not to be served by compromise. 
In matters of expediency, compromise all that is neces- 
sary for peace and harmony — for expedients are human, 
and subject to revision ; but when it comes to the 
truth and ordinances of the gospel — to that which 
rests on the authority of the Lord Jesus, — stand by 
every jot and tittle of these, though the heavens fall. 
All that we insist on as essential to Christian union 
bears the stamp of catholicity. I hear it said of some 
of our preachers, that they preach for years without so 
much as one sermon on first principles. I greatly re- 
gret to hear it. How any preacher can satisfy his own 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES 333 

conscience in allowing years to slip by without declar- 
ing the whole counsel of God — without once giving a 
full scriptural answer to the question, What must I do 
to be saved ? — is to me a painful mystery. No, my 
brethren, let us "not shun to declare the whole coun- 
sel of God," for in this way only can we be " free from 
the blood of all men." There may not be, in many 
communities, a need of as constant a repetition of the 
terms of the gospel as formerly, because these are now 
very generally understood. There are some points of 
doctrine and practice, formerly disputed, that are now 
conceded, and there is no longer a need for controver- 
sial sermons in their support. There is generally no 
demand for belligerent preaching at all, and there is a 
loud demand for much practical preaching concerning 
Christian duties and church activities. All this is true. 
But it is also true that the whole gospel should be fully 
and boldly and unceasingly declared, without apology 
and without compromise. 

2. We have already remarked that the time has 
come when this gospel advocacy can not be sustained 
by mere argument. People look, and have a right to 
look, for fruit. We must let our light so shine that 
others shall not only hear our arguments, but see our 
good works, and so be led to glorify our Father who is 
in heaven. With this in view, we point out that we 
need : 

(1) A better church life. We need churches abound- 
ing in active ministries — ministries of preaching, teach- 
ing, ruling ; of song and prayer ; of benevolence and 
mercy ; in which all the gifts and powers of the mem- 
bership shall be brought into play. And for this pur- 
pose we need especially, in every church, an efficient 



334 FIFTY-NINE YEARS OF HISTORY, 

eldership, to lead, rule and instruct, in which there 
shall be at least one — and in large churches more than 
one — who gives all his time to preaching, teaching and 
pastoral work, training the members to active work, to 
liberal giving, and to Christlike devotion. The exper- 
ience, the study and observation of my whole life lead 
me to the conclusion that there can not be the highest 
and noblest development of church-life where this is 
wanting. If one church is too feeble to sustain such a 
ministry, then let two or three or four neighboring 
churches resolve themselves into one church with dif- 
ferent meeting-places, and thus keep at least one man 
to labor in their territory in preaching and teaching. 

(2) Co-operation in general work, for the furtherance 
of common interests. It is popular in some quarters to 
denounce all co-operation outside of the membership 
of individual churches as a departure from the practice 
of the fathers of the reformation, and all missionary 
and other benevolent associations as " innovations/' 
If this were true, we are not aware that it is a mortal 
sin to depart from the teaching or practice of the 
fathers of this reformation. I, at least, never bound 
myself to adhere to their teaching, nor will I. While 
honoring them for their faithful service, and paying all 
due respect to their teaching, we can not, consistently 
with our principles, follow them any farther than they 
follow the teaching of Jesus and his apostles. And in 
regard to methods of working, we have as good a right 
to our judgment as they had to theirs. To attempt to 
make adherence to the teaching of the fathers a test 
of soundness in the faith, is to attempt to establish a 
sect as thoroughly sectarian as any we have opposed 
and denounced. But the simple truth is, that when 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 335 

Walter Scott came to New Lisbon and initiated the 
work we have been describing, he was in the employ- 
ment of the Maho7ting Association. The whole glorious 
work of reformation in all this region was under the 
auspices of that Association. Not only Walter Scott, 
but Adamson Bentley, Marcus Bosworth and William 
Hayden were set to work under the direction of that 
Association, and during the last year of that Associa- 
tion's existence, over one thousand conversions were 
reported within the limits of its territory as the result 
of associated effort. The dissolution of that Associa- 
tion, while it was favored by Walter Scott, was in op- 
position to the more practical judgment of Alexander 
Campbell, and men like William Hayden never ceased 
to deplore it. It was at a juncture when the condition 
of numerous infant churches and the widening fields 
for mission work required more than ever the combined 
wisdom and resources of the churches. But in a mo- 
ment of rashness this system of co-operation was dis- 
solved. The infant churches were left to struggle 
through the perils of infancy, or to die. The inviting 
fields of labor that opened on every hand were neg- 
lected or irregularly occupied by any preacher that 
could spare the time and labor, and the work that had 
gone so gloriously forward under the Association suf- 
fered seriously. We have been trying now for over 
thirty years to recover lost ground ; and to this day we 
reap the unhappy consequences of what I can not help 
regarding as the folly of that hour. 

But more than this is true. The early work of the 
Campbells, to which we now point with delight, was 
accomplished through an Association; and in 1827, 
an assemblage of church delegates, known as the Wash- 



336 FIFTY-NINE YEARS OF HISTORY. 

ington Association, sent out Thomas Campbell and an 
associate into Northern Pennsylvania as evangelists ; 
and the Somerset church, with all her glorious history, 
is one of the fruits of associated missionary effort. 
This reformation was begun and nursed into strength 
by co-operative missionary associations. If there was 
any sin in it, it is a sin which, so far as we are informed, 
was never repented of, or deplored, or repudiated, by 
the Campbells and their associates ; while the over- 
throw of the Mahoning Association was, we know, 
lamented and deplored by the Campbells, the Hay- 
dens, the Bentleys, and many more of the wise and 
good men of that period. 

My own conviction is that we have lost immensely 
by the surrender of the co-operative principle, and that 
one part of our future work is to restore it fully for the 
furtherance of all common interests. There is no need 
for any cumbrous ecclesiastical machinery, nor for any 
interference with the rights of congregations. 

Experience may and should teach us to avoid dan- 
gers, and reveal to us the simplest and most effective 
methods of co-operation. But, whatever may be the 
methods, we need to work steadily in the direction of 
a combination of our forces, especially for missionary 
purposes at home and abroad. Were this one point 
gained, we could, without oppressing any, have means 
enough and missionaries enough to make our presence 
felt not only in every nook and corner of our land, but 
in the four quarters of the globe, and in the islands of 
the seas. 

(3) A practical exhibition of that union for which 
we plead. It is vain to preach union to the Protestant 
world if we are not ourselves united. Our position is 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 337 

catholic. We propose to receive into fellowship all 
who acknowledge ' ' one Lord, one faith, one bap- 
tism," and to hold in fellowship all who walk in obed- 
ience to Jesus Christ. We protest against any other 
test of fellowship than that of faith in the Lord Jesus 
Christ and obedience to Him. But outside of this 
faith there will be found many opinions among be- 
lievers ; and outside of the direct precepts of the New 
Testament there will be found a necessity for many 
expedients, or methods of working, in order to accom- 
plish the purposes of the church's existence. Here we 
say: Let every man be fully persuaded in his own 
mind as to his opinions, but let him not attempt to 
force them on others, or to erect them into tests of 
fellowship. And in regard to expedients we say : 
Study the things that make for peace and for edifica- 
tion. Adopt the expedients that can best be agreed 
on, and let us be subject one to another. But just 
here it is easy to give to usages and prejudices all the 
sacredness of divine authority. We may differ about 
the erection of a meeting-house, or about an organ, or 
a choir, or a missionary society, or lesson-leaves ; and 
there will not be found wanting those who would make 
either the use or non-use of these a test of fellowship, 
threatening the peace of the church if their prejudice 
or preference is disregarded. Just here we must be 
watchful. The kingdom of God is not meat and drink. 
Better that meats and drinks be allowed, better that 
meats and drinks be abandoned, than that the kingdom 
of God should be dishonored. And the kingdom of 
God is not organs, or choirs, or hymn-books, or mis- 
sionary societies. Better these than strife in the king- 
dom of God ; better the loss of these than strife in the 



33^ FIFTY-NINE YEARS OF HISTORY, 

kingdom of God, which is ' ( righteousness, peace and 
joy in the Holy Spirit." In all these things there must 
be forbearance and self-surrender, trusting to the power 
of brotherly love and the wisdom gained by experience 
to bring us all right at last. ' ' Let the younger be in 
subjection to the elder, yea, all of you be in subjec- 
tion to one another." " Let none please him- 
self, but every one seek to please his brother to edifi- 
cation." If we prove not our own worst enemies by a 
violation of the law of Christian liberty on one hand, 
or of the law of Christian love on the other, it is not 
in the power of any outside foe to weaken our plea for 
Christian union. 

(4) A vigilant maintenance of the integrity of the 
church and of Christian character. The perilous days 
of the church are not the days of her weakness and 
unpopularity, when the world is hostile, and the church 
in its weakness is driven to the shelter of the throne of 
grace. It is when the church has grown into sufficient 
strength and wealth to command popular favor, and the 
world begins to smile graciously; when men of the 
world, half converted, feel like patronizing the church, 
and men in the church, scarcely half converted, feel 
like patronizing the world. Then come desires to 
make the worship of the church as spectacular as pos- 
sible, to please refined worldly tastes, and efforts to 
lure the world into the support of the church by 
means of dramatic performances, lotteries, grab-bags, 
raffiings, and whatever can bring the church and the 
world together in fashionable amusements and follies. 
And soon you hear of card-tables and dances in Chris- 
tian homes, and of attendance at balls, and theaters, 
etc., etc. And much worse than all this, you will find 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 339 

Christians at horse-races, and in saloons, and in gam- 
bling hells, and in the reckless gamblings of boards of 
trade, and stock-rooms, and gold-rooms, and in every 
daring speculation, and in every infamous rascality ; 
and the distinction between the church and the world 
comes to be mainly one of profession. I confess that 
I fear here more than at any other point. These 
temptations come to us on the softer side of our nature. 
A little yielding at first, merely through complaisance, 
prepares the way for a good-natured exchange of flat- 
teries and amenities, which end in making the church 
a place of fashionable attractions for the world, and the 
world a place of fashion and amusement and indulgence 
for the church, until all hostilities cease, and a truce — 
deadly to all spiritual interests — is proclaimed. Now, 
I am not speaking as an ascetic, which I never was ; 
nor as a misanthrope, for I love my fellow-men, and 
have hosts of friends among men of the world, many 
of whom I not only respect, but admire for many at- 
tractive qualities. But I speak as a Christian, with 
whom the honor of Christ and the purity of His church 
are paramount considerations. With all due respect 
to men of the world, and with a full recognition of 
their claims to friendly regard and fellowship as men, 
as neighbors, and as citizens, I insist that the church 
has aims and objects, and interests that should never 
be compromised. Let the church, by systematic, gen- 
erous giving, support herself and do her own work, 
without getting down on her knees to beg the charities 
of the world. If men of the world voluntarily and 
generously offer assistance, receive it thankfully — but 
let it be their own generous offer, the token of a lively 
sympathy with the work of the church. But let not 



340 FIFTY-NINE YEARS OF HISTORY, 

the church degrade herself by alluring, or teasing, or 
persecuting men of the world into the support of a 
divine institution from mere worldly considerations, 
and thus put a gag into her own mouth that forbids 
all fearless utterance of rebuke and warning. Let 
Christians be joyful, but let them be joyful in the Lord. 
Let their associations and recreations comport with the 
purity and dignity and spirituality that belong to Chris- 
tian life. Without phariseeism, and without any offen- 
sive parade of piety, let them, by their cheerful dignity 
and gentleness and purity, commend the truth to every 
man's conscience in the sight of God. Especially, let 
them keep clean hands in their dealings, and separate 
themselves from everything avaricious, dishonest, in- 
temperate and impure, that the name of Christian may 
be the equivalent of truthfulness, honesty and integrity. 
If to these are conjoined intelligence, refined tastes, 
and philanthropy, the power of the church for good 
will be well nigh omnipotent. 

(5) Back of all these, and underneath all these, we 
need that consecration to Christ ', without which any profes- 
sion of religion is little better than a mockery. When we 
can say, ''Christ liveth in me," — when Christ is the 
life-power of the soul — when, unembarrassed by theo- 
logical speculations, our spiritual powers are absorbed 
in admiration and love of Jesus, and His life and death 
and resurrection assert their transforming power over 
our thoughts, affections, principles, ambitions and as- 
pirations, so that we are ready to live or die for Him, 
and brain and heart and purse are all subject to His 
control, then all else that we have commended will be 
found both easy and delightful. 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 34 1 

We have spoken of a period of fifty-nine years — 
little more than half a century. This is a brief period ; 
yet what changes have swept over us within that time ! 
" Our fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do 
they live forever?" The Campbells, and Scott, and 
Osborne, and Gaston, and Bentley, and Henry, and 
the Haydens, and Hartzel, and Rains, and Richardson, 
and Mitchell, and the Bosworths, and Almon B. 
Green, and nearly every one of the men identified 
with the stirring scenes we have bedn contemplating, 
have passed away from us. The men of manly form, 
of trumpet-tone, of tearful eye, of chivalric spirit and 
bearing, whose logic shattered so many idols, whose 
teaching* poured light into thousands of benighted 
hearts — a light so strange and strong that it seemed to 
many like a new revelation — whose eloquence swept 
over great throngs as the tempest sweeps over the 
forest, bowing everything before it — they are gone. 
They linger only in halls of memory and hearts of 
love. But though they are gone, the truth remains, 
and they have repeated their lives a thousand times 
over in the lives of others. They fought bravely, and 
went down with colors flying, and younger hands 
grasped the banner from their dying hands and held it 
aloft over their dead bodies and over their graves. 
And the generation that succeeded them and supple- 
mented their labors is growing old. There may be 
several years of good work in most of us yet ; but we 
are growing old, and soon "the keepers of the house 
shall tremble, and the strong men shall bow them- 
selves, and the grinders cease because they are few, 
and those that look out of the windows be darkened, 
. . . . and the almond tree shall flourish, and the 



34 2 FIFTY-NINE YEARS OF HISTORY, 

grasshopper shall be a burden, and desire shall fail 
because man goeth to his long home and the mourners 
go about the streets. . . . Then shall the dust 
return to the earth as it was ; and the spirit shall re- 
turn to God that gave it. " I do not know that we 
need to regret this. I am not out of humor with the 
world I live in, nor am I in any hurry to get out of it. 
Even in the darkest hours this life has had many 
charms for me, and I have never seen the day when I 
had not more reasons for thanksgiving than for mur- 
muring. I love the blue heavens, and the bright stars, 
and the glorious sunlight, and the earth and the waters, 
the birds and the flowers, the grass and the green 
trees; above all, I love the faces of friends,, and the 
busy tribes of humanity ; yet I think it is well, when 
one's work is done, and he is utterly tired, to go home 
and rest — rest where there are brighter heavens, and 
richer flowers, and sweeter songs, and purer hearts, 
and holier friendships ; where those whom we tenderly 
loved here will be lovelier and dearer to us than ever, 
and where we shall again greet with joy, as bright im- 
mortals, those noble men of whom we have spoken to- 
day. Though I feel myself less than the least of them 
in ability, and unworthy to stand with them in the 
same rank for heroism and self-sacrifice, yet in integ- 
rity of heart and honesty I shall claim kinship with 
them, and look them honestly in the face in the day 
when the sowers and reapers shall rejoice together. 
That day is not far distant — and the banners and the 
weapons of war must be left to the third generation, 
the young preachers who are now rising into useful- 
ness. My dear young brethren, I charge you before 
God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, and the elect angels, 



AND OTHER ADDRESSES. 343 

that you be loyal to Jesus, faithful to His word, true to 
the interests of His kingdom. I do not ask you to be 
tame and slavish imitators of those who have gone 
before you, or that you shall close your eyes to any 
truth that may be made clear to you ; but I do ask 
that you shall be true to the principles in which you 
have been educated, for they are divine, apostolic, 
catholic, immutable ; true to Christ in vindicating His 
name, His honor, His authority and in preaching and 
teaching His whole truth to the people. I ask that 
you shall not seek to evade the self-sacrifice without 
which you will not be worthy to act as leaders of the 
armies of Israel. I ask that you shall set your faces 
like flint against all error and wrong, and dare to be 
right, according to your best light, whatever the con- 
sequences. I ask that with your superior advantages 
you shall endeavor to improve on your predecessors in 
all that is manly and generous and noble and magnani- 
mous, and avoid all envyings and jealousies and un- 
seemly strifes, and stand like a Macedonian phalanx in 
defense of the truth and in aggressive warfare against 
error and sin. I ask that you shall at least equal your 
fathers in reverence for the word of God, in its diligent 
study and in committing it to memory, that it may 
dwell in you richly. And I ask that you bend your 
energies to perfect the work which others have begun, 
in uniting the sympathies and prayers and labors of 
our entire brotherhood for the spread of the gospel 
and the salvation of the world. And may the God of 
your fathers be your God and your portion evermore. 
Finally, beloved brethren and sisters, one and all, 
let us love one another, and walk in love, as Christ 
hath loved us and given himself for us. Let us raise 



344 FIFTY-NINE YEARS OF HISTORY. 

in our pathway to-day a monumental pillar, and in- 
scribe on it Eben-ezer, and say, ' ' Hitherto hath the 
Lord helped us." With earnest and joyful thanks- 
giving for the wonderful mercies of the past, let us 
gird ourselves anew for the work yet before us, and go 
out with fresh inspirations of faith and hope and love 
to the work that is yet to be done, and work while the 
day lasts. And when the night cometh and we can 
work no longer, may the gates of light through which 
so many have passed into eternal day open to receive 
us into the paradise of God, to the fellowship of saints, 
to the presence of Jesus, to the beatific vision in whose 
raptures the sorrows and trials of earth shall be remem- 
bered no more. 

"Now unto Him that is able to do exceeding abun- 
dantly above all that we ask or think, according to the 
power that worketh in us, unto Him be glory in the 
Church and in Christ Jesus, unto all generations, for 
ever and ever. Amen." 



INDEX. 



Abel, Murder of (painting), 270. 

Ability, According to our, 131 ; 
measure of accountability, 205. 

Ablogenesis, 309. 

Abraham and Jewish nation, 68. 

Acts Hi. 19, 236. 

Adversaries, There are many, 79, 
91 : rationalism, 91 ; Roman 
Catholicism, 91 ; secular spirit 
of age, 92, 93 ; worldliness, 94. 

Affection of people for Garfield, 
Secret of, 277. 

Africa: vail of darkness lifted, 173, 

Agassiz : belief in theism, 303. 

Agencies rescuing from darkness : 
154; Alfred the Great, 154; 
Aristotle, 154; compass, the, 154; 
Crusades, the, 154; Justinian 
Code, 1 54 ; learning, revival of, 
154; printing 154. 

Ages, The dark, 247; steadfast 
hope of the, 311. 

Age, Secular spirit of the, 92, 93 ; 
this, product of all the ages, 137. 

Ahab and Elijah, 30. 

Anak, Sons of, 215. 

Ancients, We are the, 137. 

Anecdote : Dr. Chalmers and his 
horse, 38 ; clergyman did n't 
know bran, 21 ; Crocket, Davy, 
and the President, 56; Dis- 
raeli's wife, 47; eminent liter- 



ary gentlemen, 3S ; Fink, Mike, 
10 ; Hindoo and New Zealander, 
224; Irishman, fall from scaf- 
fold, 17; missionary distributing 
tracts, 27; Niagara river: three 
young men, 10; Vesuvius and 
Niagara Falls, 37; Ward, Arte- 
mus', love of country, 39 ; 
Yankee and foreigner, 37. 

Anglo-Saxon : best educated popu- 
lation, 158; destinies of the 
world, 157 j in elements of 
greatness, 157 ; energy and perse- 
verance, 157; free, enlightened 
governments, 158; great practi- 
cal talent, 158; largest com- 
merce, 158; literature, science 
art, 158; military skill, 158; 
noblest living language, 158; 
purest form of religion, 158. 
Most wonderful people, 164. 

Anxious about things remote, 39. 

Aristocracy, Downfall of, 16S, 169; 
of letters, 236. 

Ark of bulrushes drifting on Nile, 
249. 

Armenianism, Cut up by roots, 237. 

Art comes down from ancient na- 
tions, 145 ; streams back to 
Chaldea, 144. 

Babylon : center of learning, 145. 

Bacon, Lord, Instauration, 228. 
345 



346 



INDEX. 



Baptism: action, no surrender, 331 ; 
design, 331 ; importance of, 322 ; 
subjects: nosurrender,33i; teach- 
ing, N. T. concerning, 318. 

Baptist, John the, 332. 

Baptists, Free, 332; Redstone 
Association, 313; standard doc- 
trine: Pa. C. F.,312. 

Barbarians, Irruption of northern, 

15. 

Beau, An English 14th century, 2 ; 

Bells, Sabbath, Spurgeon on Ven- 
ice, 48, 49 ; marriage, heavenly 
in distance, 49. 

Benefactions, Educational, 184. 

Bible: as well depend on old al- 
manac, 314; as a revelation of 
God to man, 61 ; demand to 
banish from schools, 257; de- 
mand to banish teaching, 247 ; 
denial of, 303 ; English, first 
printed in America, 182 ; loving 
and reading, subjected to tor- 
ments, 230 ; much more, living 
word, 328 ; our hands on the, 
23 1; pledge to maintain, whole, 
alone, 231 ; at peril of lives, 
231 ; transmit to children, 231 ; 
read as act of piety, 314 ; read- 
ers need purging, idols of den, 
239 ; sealed book to multitude, 
314, 315 ; societies belong to 
this century, 174; their number, 
183 ; the, and Bible alone, 132, 
133; translated at all? 231; 
translated faithfully, 231 ; trans- 
lated fully, 231; translated — 
whole world, 238 ; Union, Am., 
has found idols of den, 229 ; 
Union, Am., means, appliances, 
241 ; we need no new, 194. 



Bigotry, first-class, 304. 

Borioboola Gha, 40, 41. 

Brethren : young, to be loyal, 343 ; 
young, to dare to be right, 343 ; 
young, to perfect the work, 343. 

Brotherhood : holy and loving, 
237; of man, 285. 

Burmah's barren plain, 216, 217. 

Burns' Cotter's Saturday Night, 
56, 57- 

Caleb and grapes of Esehol, 215. 

Calvin : stern, uncompromising, 30 ; 
theology, 155. 

Calvinism cut up by roots, 237 ; 
doctrinally set forth, 312. 

Campbell, A. : Essays on Baptism, 
324 ; debate with McCalla, 322 ; 
Thos., Evangelist, 336 ; Thos. 
visits Scott, 323. 

Campbells, The : early work in 
association, 335. 

Candelabrum, Golden seven- 
branched, 230. 

Carlyle, Thos., says of Jesus, 263. 

Carey, William, For. Miss., 213- 
217-220. 

Century : ablaze with glories, 171 ; 
Bible societies belong to the, 
174; Bible translation belongs 
to, 174; changes in governments 
great, 172; first steam navigation 
in American waters — just a, 171 ; 
moral and religious progress of 
the, 182 ; progress, lessons from, 
190; slave trade put down in 
this, 174; religious movements, 
beginning of, 318. 

Chaldea, Plains of: art and science 
to, 144. 

Chalmers, Dr., anecdote of, 38. 

Character, Christian : integrity of, 



INDEX. 



347 



338 ; figured with certainty — 
given latitude and longitude, 
256; fixed at early period, 7; 
formed by controlling power, 
seas, etc., 256. 

Charity begins at home, 206. 

Cherubim, Him that dwelleth be- 
tween the, 230. 

Chicago : immigrants yearly, 245 ; 
city large as, 245. 

China, Opium trade forced upon, 

173- 

Chinee, Heathen, swallowed pig- 
tail, etc., 245 ; not elevated above 
oyster, 245. 

Chivalry: poetry of arms, 153, 

*54- 

Christ : but one in history of our 
race, 260 ; character grows with 
the ages, 260; consecration to, 
340; crucified, sinner's friend, 
331 ; divinity of, central truth of 
Christianity, 319; Jesus is the, 
320; Jesus, none to compare 
with, 260; love of, passeth 
knowledge, 296; midmost in 
world's history, 76; no blem- 
ish on character of, 260; no 
improved leader, 260; no im- 
proved Saviour, 260 ; our guide, 
193, 194; personal object, sav- 
ing faith, 320 ; spirit of in rulers, 
legislators, a force, 286 ; suffering 
for dear love of, 215 ; teaches 
justice and humanity, 286; the 
divine man, 261 ; highway of 
holiness, 267 ; Holy One, 261 ; 
will educate for heaven, 267 ; 
will steer me clear of hell, 267. 

Christian, Politician can not afford 
to be, 281; civilization, onward 



march of, 195 ; Connection older 
than we, 332 ; integrity never 
surrendered, 281 ; Polynesia, not 
one in seventy years ago, 221 ; 
what it is to be a, 268. 

Christianity : all are one in Christ, 
223 ; appeals to humanity, 223 ; 
brings men into brotherhood, 
223 ; central truth of, 320-329 ; 
denial of, 303 ; early triumphs 
owing to, etc., 295; establish- 
ment of, 142; Froude, thing of 
the past, 257; history of, a 
mighty epic, 144; means redemp- 
tion of humanity, 223 ; neither 
Jew nor Greek in, 320 ; on teach- 
ing, Scott, 320; philosophy, 
the highest, 144; poetry, the 
highest, 144; principles, faith, 
application of, 194; religion of 
the race, 223 ; thing of the past, 
257, 258. 

Christians joyful in the Lord, 340 ; 
Judson's labors, 216; expedi- 
ents surrendered for, union of, 
331; united front would shake 
hell, 238 ; universal priesthood 
admitted, 316; universal priest- 
hood ignored, 316. 

Church : devoted to home work, 
208 ; and world, no marked dis- 
tinction, 21, 22; at Pittsburgh, 
320 ; found Garfield a poor boy, 
287 ; inspired him with courage, 
287 ; sheltered him from tempta- 
tion, 287 ; integrity of the, $3^ \ 
life, a better, 333 ; of Christ 
found in family of Abraham, 315 ; 
Garden of Eden, 316; Jewish 
nation, 315 ; of God, Son of 
the, 287; outside of, another 



348 



INDEX. 



class, 22, 23, 24; opens her 
doors to the lowly, 287 ; place of 
fashionable attraction, 339 ; per- 
ilous days of the, 338; to disciple 
the nations, 199; voice to the, 
death of Garfield, 287. 

Churches, American Congress of, 
329 ; failing to give are crippled, 
207 ; first duty at home, 207 ; 
Protestant, membership, 183 ; to 
help the world, 207; to help 
weaker churches, 207. 

Citizenship, Ignorance no bar to, 
245 ; moral, intelligent, 247 ; 
rights of, 245. 

Civilizations, Ancient, in dotage, 
150; developed Assyria and 
Egypt, 67, 68 ; Greece and Rome 
utter failures, 70. 

Clergy called of God as Aaron, 315; 
daring to question teaching of, 
315 ; divinely appointed like Le- 
vites, 315 ; erected into a special 
order, 315; exclusive right to 
administer sacraments, 316; ex- 
clusive right to preach and 
teach, 316; expounders Word of 
God, 315; might dispute among 
themselves, 316; specially called 
of God, 316. 

Clergyman who did n't know bran, 
38. 

Clerical element less exclusive, 
329 ; robes of linsey woolsey, 18, 
19. 

Cobbe, Frances Power, says of 
Jesus, 264. 

College, Boys at, 51 ; life — full of 
temptations, 51. 

Colleges : moral influence decreas- 
ing, 247. 



Columbus : envied immortality, 
164. 

Compromise, Delilah of, 332. 

Conflict between religion and sci- 
ence, 297. 

Control, Free from denominational, 
241, 

Conscience, Public, debauched, 247. 

Consecration to God, offers life 
freely, spends money, welcomes 
toil, 197. 

Conservative, A croaking, 163 ; 
in England's struggle, a Con- 
formist; in Jesus' day, a digni- 
fied Pharisee ; in Luther's day, a 
defender of indulgences; in the 
Revolution, a Tory, 163. 

Conversion, Supernatural theory 
of, 196 ; without Bible or preach- 
ing, 196. 

Convict, History of a, 226. 

Commencement day, The great, 
252-269. 

Common Version : no answer — 
what God promises to me, 237 ; 
what God wants of me, 237. 

Co-operation dissolved under Scott, 
335; in general work, 334; 
simplest method of, 336. 

Counselors, A multitude of, 240. 

Country, Artemus Ward's love of, 
39; this a great, 244; opened to 
men of every language, 245; 
dangers threatening our, 187 ; 
fate of our — Macaulay, 16 ; prin- 
ciples of compromise, 160, 161. 

Courting, Best to keep on, 44. 

Creed, Apostles' — Episcopalians, 
327; authority, Baptist fountain 
of, 317; authority diminished, 
327; authority on the^wane, 89; 



INDEX. 



349 



authority still potent, 330; de- 
nominational, source of weak- 
ness, 330. 

Creeds, Baptist Ass'n churches had, 
316; Baptists dropped their, 324; 
human, 84; of binding authori- 
ty, 316; human, tests of fellow- 
ship, 316; no admittance to 
church without su omission to, 
316. 

Criticism, sacred : imperfect state of, 
209. 

Cross, The, in our sermons, 215; 
in our songs, not on our shoul- 
ders ; on our lips ; scared at 
shadow of, 215. 

Crusoe, Robinson, 6. 

Culture : a broad range in colleges, 
252 ; Christian, for Christ's sake, 
for country's sake, for humanity's 
sake, 248. 

Danger of getting things mixed, 7.- 

Dangers threatening our country, 
187. 

Darwin's theory, survival of fit- 
test, 266. 

Death constantly occurred, 247. 

Delilah of compromise, 332. 

Deliverer, The, appeared, 149. 

Depravity, Total, of human nature, 
312. 

De Quincey, Thomas, translation of 
Scriptures into Greek, 73, 74. 

Development, Progressive, per- 
vades universe, 62 ; same lesson 
on every page, 62. 

Devil, Bible conception of the, 
270. 

Diana, Great is, of Ephesians, 228. 

Dirt philosophy pervades science, 
etc., 256. 



Door, A great and effectual, 79; 
its meaning, 79 ; of faith, to the 
Gentiles, 79. 

Duty, Awake to, night far spent, 
226; of family to help others, 
207 ; of family to help its own, 
207 ; my first, at home, 206 ; our 
first at home, 203, 205, 206; to 
be done, God will care, etc., 
214; to go into all the world, 
214 ; to preach the gospel, 214. 

Dwarfs, Danger of becoming, 254 ; 
lopsided, squinting, Brobdig- 
nagian eye, Lilliputian body, 
symbol of intellectual deform- 
ity, 254. 

Ecclesiastics, depositaries of learn- 
ing, 152. 

Education, Bureau of — latest report, 
181; broad, a safeguard, 254; 
for life eternal, 269 ; graduates 
into actual life, 252 ; imparts 
ideas, tastes, etc., 252; leads to 
fellowship, beauty, etc., 252; 
mixing process, 24, 25 ; not 
merely to make dollars, 251 ; 
of the people, our only hope, 
188, 189; secular, 95; teaches 
language immortality, 252; val- 
uable to man as an immortal, 
251 ; valued by dollars and cents, 
252. 

Eldership, Efficient, needed, 334. 

Election, Personal, unconditional, 
312. 

Elijah, stern, terrible, 30. 

Encouragements : great and effect- 
ual door, 84. 

England, Slow, steady progress of, 

173. 174. 
Ephesians, Diana of the, 22S. 



35o 



INDEX. 



Errett, Henry: appendix to N. 
Y. circular letter, 318 ; lectures 
on the four gospels, 319. 

Eschol, Grapes of, 215. 

European society, Slow movement 
of, 160. 

Europe upheaving with revolution, 

245. 

Evolution, Darwin's theory of, 
301 ; theory not demonstrated, 
306. 

Expediency : compromise for peace, 
332. 

Expedients, Human, 332; surren- 
dered, 331. 

Experience, College of, 252. 

Eye, Blind, of Lord Nelson, 232 ; 
salve, 232 ; true, 232. 

Eyes, Lord, open the, 230. 

Eyes, Open thou th«, of men ; the 
blear eye of prejudice, the 
closed of the bigot, the distorted 
of superstition, the jaundiced of 
sect, the squint of unblief, 232. 

Failure of success in life, Cause of, 
249. 

Faith and patience, 213 ; Christian, 
importance of, 248 ; cometh by 
hearing, 213; definite, untremb- 
ling, 255 ; erred concerning the, 
311 J need of heroic element in, 
214; need of heroism that laughs, 
etc., 214; popular religions, 312; 
proper object of, 320; underlies 
all peace and goodness, 48 ; un- 
settled by smatterings, etc., 255 ; 
too soft, too effeminate, 215 ; 
Westminster Confession of, 312. 

Falls of Niagara, Blondin's cable, 
267. 

Family, Duty of, to help others, 



207 ; duty of, to its own mem- 
bers, 207. 

Fatherhood and motherhood, 44. 

Fathers, Teaching of the, the test of 
faith, 334 ; our, where are they, 

341. 
Faust, Johannes, 116. 
Field: thou shalt not sow divers 

kinds of seeds, 5. 
Fellowship, Creeds tests of, 316; 

of God, to delight in involves 

choice and turning, 316; tests of, 

337; with the Father and his 

Son, 295. 
Fleas, Moses devoured by, 233. 
Foster, Death of John, poem, 

no. 
Forrester, George, of Pittsburgh, 

318-320. 
France gives hope of her Republic, 

173. 

Franklin, Benjamin, 10 1 ; absence 
of faith in Christ, III; benevo- 
lence, great, 108 ; defect in char- 
acter, 109-III; goodness, 109; 
his industry, 105; origination of 
enterprises, 106; poor, etc., 
won first rank, 104; true great- 
ness, 103 ; versatility of talent, 
106, 107. 

Fraud abounds in high places, 
in commercial circles, in Con- 
gress, in courts, in political rings, 
in State legislatures, in social 
circles, 247. 

Freedom, American doctrine of, 
travels back to Calvary, to 
Gospel of Christ, 176. 

Free government : success depends 
on, 248 ; Christian churches, 
Christian homes, Christian schol- 



INDEX. 



351 



ars, Christian schools, Christian 

teachers, moral and religious 

culture, 248. 
Friends ahead, To, 163 ; astern, 

to, 163. 
Fruit : people look for it, 333. 
Froude, James Anthony, 257. 
Galatians v. 20 : works of the flesh, 

237- 

Garfield, James Abram : address 
at funeral, 275 ; a noble friend of 
humanity, 276 ; as educator, 
as lawyer, as legislator, as orator, 
as party chieftain, as soldier, as 
ruler, 277 ; assassination, 186; 
call to arms; 282; candidate for 
Ohio State Senate, 282; com- 
passed all conditions of life, 279 ; 
conversion, 277, 278 ; election 
to Congress, 283 ; election to 
United States Senate, 283 ; grand 
life, 281 ; his children, 291 ; 
his mother, 290 ; his wife, 
290 ; honest and capable, 279 ; 
nomination to Presidency, 283 ; 
teacher and interpreter of 
hearts, 279. 

Garment : arraying lives in linsey 
woolsey, 7 ; linen and woolen, 
I, 2 ; many colors, 1, 2. 

Gates opened, 95. 

Generation spontaneous, 302 ; 
bone of contention, 308 ; failure 
a, 306. 

Geology may stagger me, 266. 

Germany shows signs of progress, 
174. 

God, Acceptance with, 313 ; Fath- 
erhood of, 285 ; is righteousness, 
337 ; kingdom of, not meat and 
drink, 337 ; not organs — tuning 



forks, 337 ; light of, to dim, 234 ; 
people of, union of the, 238 ; 
separated from, 67 ; redeem the 
whole world to, 131 ; whole 
counsel of, ^^ ; whole will of, 
234 ; Word of, every, is pure, 
239 ; give th understanding, 235 ; 
life-directing, 235 ; life-giving, 
235 ; life-sustaining, 235 ; light- 
giving, 235; quickening power, 
235; sanctifying, 239 ; sword of 
the Spirit, 314; without Holy 
Spirit, dead letter, 314; world 
going to school to, 69. 

God's eternal purpose in redemp- 
tion, 66; eternal purpose, un- 
folding of, 66 ; method of work- 
ing, 62. 

Gods, Two — one good,one bad, 296. 

Goethe: many sided, 253; says 
of Jesus, 262. 

Gnosticism, 294. 

Gospel and the Law, Discriminat- 
ing between the, 315 ; central 
truth of the, 321 ; converson of 
heathen without preaching the, 
212; faithful preaching of, 331 ; 
given us in trust, 227 ; new ad- 
vocacy of the, Scott, 317; not a 
proclamation of amnesty, 314; 
preached to every new creature, 
313; revelation, 294; spread of 
in foreign lands, 213 ; success in 
preaching depends, 80, 8 1 ; the 
power of God, 80; the, took 
on form of fact, 295 ; the whole, 
fully declared, 331 ; truth and 
ordinances, stand by, 332 ; truths 
of, God's commands divine, 

. 33i- 
Gray's Elegy, 288. 



352 



INDEX. 



Greece, Heroic ages of, gave birth 
to poetry and religion, 147. 

Grief, be off with you, 234. 

Growing old, We are, 341, 342. 

Hagar in the wilderness, 126. 

Hail, horrors, hail, 233. 

HaJJ, Gordon, 210. 

Halleluiah and Amen's echo, etc., 
224; universal, 224. 

Happiness depends much on oth- 
ers, 6. 

Harbor, Earthly, 249. 

Harp of a thousand strings, one 
tune, 253. 

Haven of rest, 249. 

Hebrews : their mission, 148 ; 
moral and religious truth, 146. 

Heresies: false doctrines — Com- 
mon Version, 237 ; sects, revised 
version, 237. 

Heroes and heroines wanted, 
214; build monuments to, 231 ; 
garnish sepulchers of, 23 1 ; pray 
God to give us, 215 ; we need to 
pray for, 215. 

Hew to the line, 10. 

History: a dividing line, 132; fifty- 
nine years of, 312; not a tangled 
web, 158; of our race, 136; 
Roman Catholic, not all dark, 
152; study of, important, 137 ; 
study of past, profitable, 139. 

Holy of holies, 230; Spirit em- 
ployed words, 239; teacheth 
which, 239. 

Home affections, Decay of, 55; 
and rest, 342 ; at last, home for- 
ever, 33 j a place to eat, drink, 
sleep, 50 ; charity begins at, 
206; demanding attenlion, 43 ; 
fields, a few thoughts, 125 ; 



fields, wisdom to confine our- 
selves to, 199; is the world, 
203 ; missions, a plea for, 120; 
my, first duty at, 203 ; neglected, 
disloyal to God, 55; our first 
duty at, 206. 

Homestead, The old, 60. 

Honor to those who gave us the 
Common Version, 240. 

House-keeping, Beginning, 43. 

Howard, William, man of moder- 
ate powers, 271. 

Human nature conservative, 298. 

Humanity, Tribes of, long in wil- 
derness, 159. 

Humbugs : doctors, empiricism, 
quackery, lawyers with tricks, 
quirks, merchants selling below 
cost, 19, 20. 

Huxley, Professor : causes leading 
to organization of living matter, 
302. 

Idolatry in hearts of men, 229. 

Idols blockading entrance to tem- 
ple of truth, 228; impediments 
to restoration of physical science, 
229 ; Israel bow down to, 229 ; 
little children keep from, 230; 
Mt. Zion, base of, we erect, 229. 

Idols of the den, 228-239; of the 
market, 228 ; of the theater, 
228 ; of the tribe, 228 ; opposi- 
tion from shrines of, 234. 

Immersionists, Interests of, 236. 

Immigrants, yearly, enough to 
people Chicago, 245. 

Immortal, Such men as Clarkson, 
Howard, Washington, Wilber- 
force, 270 ; such women as 
Dorothea Dix, Emily Judson, 
Florence Nightingale, 270. 



INDEX. 



353 



Individuality not meant to annihil- 
ate, 6. 

Instauration of religious truth, 
229 ; the great, 228. 

Institutions, Collegiate, under re- 
ligious control, 183 ; divine, 
three : the family, the church, the 
state, 42 ; preservation ofomuni- 
cipal, 152, 153 ; theological, with 
permanent funds and thousands 
of students, 42. 

Integrity, Degeneracy in point of, 
in commercial circles, 16. 

Italy, Unity and freedom of, 1 73. 

Japan adopts Sunday as a day of 
rest, 220. 

Jamaica: early foreign mission, 211. 

Jehovah, revelation, plans, etc., 314. 

Jesus allowed free play among 
men : charity walks the 
earth to appoint beauty for 
ashes, to bind the broken 
heart, to proclaim liberty ; 
governments have grown, hu- 
manity-takes noblest forms, litera- 
ture has flourished, man has risen 
from serfdom, science has flour- 
ished, slavery has grown hide- 
ous, woman has risen from slav- 
ery, sin has become odious, 264 ; 
an individual, 263 ; Christ, 
the truth, round which revolves 
all other truth, 320 ; Christ has 
taught principles pure morality, 
284 ; Christhood of, one article of 
faith, 322 ; Cobbe, Frances 
Power, says of, 264 ; facts of his 
history and religion ; 265 ; faith 
in, 320 ; faith of, he is safe who 
holds on to, 3 1 1 ; grand distinction 
of Christianity, 320; greatest of 



heroes, 263; his life an ideal 
poem, 263 ; historical, 263 ; love 
for, 320 ; makes faith clear as 
noonday, 266 ; man incompar- 
able, 263 ; obedience to, 320 ; 
of Nazareth, miracle of the 
ages, 192; of Nazareth, Carlyle 
says of, 263 ; of Nazareth, 
Goethe says of, 262 ; of Naza- 
reth, SchafF says of, 261 ; Strauss 
says of, 263; Richter says of, 
262 ; Renan says of, 263 ; one 
leader and Saviour to trust, 
one plank to which my soul may 
cling, 265 ; originator of Chris- 
tian movement, 264; Parker, 
Theodore, says of, 263-265 ; 
purest among the mighty, 
262 ; safe to follow, 266 ; stead- 
fast hope of the ages, 311; 
teaches peaceful trust, 266 ; will 
never be surpassed, 263 ; would 
have taken a, to forge a, 264. 

Jerusalem all in all to first con- 
verts, 204 ; our first foreign mis- 
sion, 211. 

Joshua and grapes of Eschol, 215. 

Joy of joys, 272. 

Judson, Dr., after three years' la- 
bor, 216 ; a hero, 215; foreign 
work, influence on Baptists, 209 ; 
fruitless labor for Christ's sake, 
216; worked six years for one 
convert, 216. 

Justice to labors of the past, 240. 

Kepler feared to die of joy, 272. 

Kingdom of God is righteousness, 
is not meat and drink, is not 
organs, hymn-books, 337. 

King Josiah, The archers shot at, 
273- 



354 



INDEX. 



Knowledge, falsely so called, 296 ; 
gospel, revelation of, 294 ; love 
of Christ passeth, 296 ; not a 
shadowy philosophy, 294; that 
makes the soul pure, 252 ; which 
puffeth up, 296. 

Knox, John, stern, austere, 30. 

Labor, Division of, tends to 
dwarf, 253. 

Lads carefully and nicely trained, 
51 ; come to college with no clear 
aim, 8 ; growing up, 7 ; moral 
dress, 9 ; sowing field with div- 
ers kinds of seed, 9, 10. 

Language, channel of light and life, 
232 ; comes down from ancient 
nations, 145 ; divinely ordained, 
232; drawn to study of, 232; 
human, dignity of, 232 ; human, 
from one become many, 232; 
Old Testament, of infancy, 77. 

Liberty, Constitutional, British 
nation, 156; republican, 169. 

Life : awful, earnest, glorious, 136; 
but one to live here, 136; de- 
veloped from rude, low forms, 
256 ; is growth, 62, 63 ; source 
of, protoplasm, 256; to fail of 
true, saddest of failures, 136; to 
spend a, making pinheads, 253 ; 
voyage of, 32, 33, 

Light, Put on armor of, 227. 

Lights, False, of wreckers, 269. 

Lincoln, Abraham, one of the peo- 
ple, 167 ; perfect balance of 
character, 161 ; redeemer of 
country, 168. 

Linsey Woolsey ; arraying lives, in 
garments of, 7 ; character, reli- 
gion, 20, 21 ; moral dress of 
young men, 9. 



Livingstone, 1 73 ; a missionary, 
219; bearings of one such life, 
219; died on his knees, 220; 
work contrasted with Stanley's, 
220; work done in missionary 
spirit, 220. 

Louisville plan, 128. 

Love of Christ passeth knowledge, 
296 ; one another, 343 ; that 
buildeth up, 296; to God and 
man, 271; walk in, 343. 

Lustration at laver — in outer 
court, 230. 

Luther, Martin, 30, 231 ; hidden 
from enemies, 230; reformation 
of, 154, 155- 

Macaulay on fate of our coun- 
try, 166. 

Magna Charta: German tribes, 1 56. 

Malcontents : a growing menace in 
Germany, educated, England 
conceals a host, Europe — power- 
ful and dangerous, failure of, due 
to lack of virtue, France full of, 
impious, sensual, godless, Italy 
teems with, 246. 

Man, a lump of organized matter, 
251 ; and wife, one-ress of, also 
two-ness, 101 ; A truly great, 
IOI ; conquers time and space, 
172; genuine, battling against 
sin, 32; leaves impress on 
age, 101 ; lifted into God-like 
grandeur, 172; of loose pur- 
pose, 250; One worthy to be 
called a, 10 1; part in heaven's 
oratorio, 141 ; rules the world, 
172; to be great must be many- 
sided, 253 ; trained to careful 
reasoning, 250. 

Marriage, losing sacredness, 247. 



INDEX. 



355 



Married, Man, to a fool, woman, 
to a looney or bear, 47. 

Martin, Benjamin N., critique on 
gospels, 321. 

Martyrs, Enthusiasm roused by, 
215; for Christ's sake, 214; 
suffering in flames for love of 
Christ, 215; worth thousands of 
gold and silver, 214. 

Materialism, Present tendency to- 
ward, 255 ; tendency to, 191. 

Membership, Increase in our, in 
fifty-nine years, 325. 

Memory of a grand man, 275. 

Men : accidentally great, 102 ; faith- 
ful, suffered for translating Scrip- 
tures, 230, 231 ; good and great, 
God's best gift, 102 ; host of de- 
formed great, 102; neglecting 
their own debts, etc., 39 ; some 
owe greatness to the age, 102 ; 
young, afraid to marry, 15 ; 
young, on Niagara river, 10, 1 1 . 

Mileage, now and a century ago, 
177. 

Mill, John Stuart, missed the 
mark, 31 1. 

Mills, Samuel John, 210. 

Mind, To cultivate, alone, gives 
claws to the tiger, talons to the 
eagle, 270. 

Minds, Educated, bewildered, 256. 

Missed the mark, 311. 

Missionaries : important factors in 
progress, 174; life sacrificed, no 
apparent result, 213 ; services to 
civilization, to literature and 
science, in opening up new coun- 
tries, 219; thousands of dollars 
spent, years come and go, no 
apparent result, 213. 



Missionary : Anecdote, distribut- 
ing tracts,2l ; boards,i88o-i890, 
183 ; effort denounced, doing 
more than appears, foolish, vain, 
196; not unfruitful, 217; effort 
paralyzed by worldliness, 94; 
enterprise, gates open to, 220 ; 
organization, 1880-1890, 183 ; 
foreign society, 222 ; State, O. C. 
M. S., 326; societies in 1790, 
217; Moravian, 217; society, 
first young men's, Williams Col- 
lege, existence kept secret, 219 ; 
statistics of India, 217 ; work : 
advocates foreign missions, 200; 
Carey, Wm., 213, 217, 220; dif- 
ference of opinion, difference in 
methods, 200 ; give ourselves to, 
196 ; in Madagascar, fifty years, 
217, 218, 221 ; survey of, 218, 
219. 

Missions, Baptist, in the East, re- 
wards of faith, 216; field for, 
Mexico, South America, 220 ; 
Foreign : address, 196 ; advocates, 
work all fields, 200 ; a necessity, 
121 ; argument, 196; China gives 
access to millions, 220; Chris- 
tians in favor of, 222 ; Denmark 
questioning her faith, 220 ; de- 
nounced, Church of Scotland, 
217 ; expenditure time and 
money,2i2 ; great in comparative 
result, 212 ; first place in 
benevolence, 210; Germany 
ready for gospel, 220; India, 
revolutionizes life, 220; intelli- 
gent people opposed to, 196; 
Italy free to the gospel, 220 ; 
Jamaica, one of our first, 21 1 ; 
Jews had no, 202 ; letter from 



356 



INDEX. 



Baptist on, 209,210; platform, 
the, 196; Polynesia, seventy 
years' work, 221 ; result first 
year's work F. C. M. S., 222 ; 
Sandwich Islands, fifty years' 
work, 221 ; society, eleven years' 
report, 326 ; society organized, 
222; South Sea Islands, fifty 
years' work, 221 ; unscriptural, 
198 ; Gospel, started by Saul of 
Tarsus, 204. 

Home : advantage of early pos- 
session, advantage of early settle- 
ment, 124; and foreign, differ- 
ence between advocates, differ- 
ence in importance, difference 
in obligation, 199; and for- 
eign in the gospels, 204 ; a plea 
for, 120 ; confine ourselves to, 198 ; 
Freedmen,needs of, 122 ; founda- 
tions deep and strong, 125 ; im- 
mense territory — W., N. W., S. 
W., 123 ; Jews, the, had no, 202 ;» 
magnitude of the work, 121 ; men 
free from old moorings, hunger- 
ing for instruction, 1 25; New 
England pleads for, 122 ; our 
brethren long and pray for, 
125; present condition of work, 
198 ; Saviour, the, started two, 
Saviour's not ignored, prepara- 
tory, 203 ; Scriptures, no dis- 
tinction between foreign and, 
201, 202; Scriptures make dis- 
tinction between foreign and, 
202 ; West and Northwest unite 
to work, 122 ; wisdom to con- 
fine our efforts to, 199 ; years 
of greatest prosperity in, 21 1 ; 
of educated minds and hearts, 
248 ; Protestant, in China, 220; 



Society for heathen, at hay- 
stack, 210; without regard to 
plan, 201. 

Mirage in desert of life, 138. 

Mohammedanism, Rise of, 153. 

Monopolies, Powerful, growing 
up, 246. 

Morality, Pure, principles of, 284. 

Motherhood and fatherhood, 44. 

Mourning, No, like this, 274 ; time 
of, 273. 

Movements, Jehovah's, on centers 
of learning, 69. 

Names, Denominational, a weak- 
ness, 330. 

Napoleon in banishment, 138. 

Narrowness, Impression of, 252. 

Nation, A, in tears, 274 ; Jewish, 
and Abraham, 68. 

Nations : compare bond with free, 
Catholic with Protestant, Chris- 
tian with heathen, medieval 
with modern, 235 ; destinies 
hang on look or word, 141 ; 
historical, to prepare soil for 
Christianity: Greek — science and 
art, Jew — religious element, Ro- 
man — political element, 75; prog- 
ress of from barbarism to civiliza- 
tion, marked by poetry and phi- 
losophy, 143; Protestant, where 
Christ is free, where gospel has 
free course, 265. 

Nature and revelation — same au- 
thor, 63. 

Negro enfranchised, 245. 

Neighborhood, Neglect of our 
own, 37. 

Neighbor, Thou shalt love thy, 6. 

Newspaper, First, in North Ameri- 
ca, 117. 



INDEX. 



357 



Newspapers, All, entire circulation, 
1870, 1 79-; all, growth, circula- 
tion and value, 179; daily, 1873, 
and now, 178; daily, 189 1, 178; 
Jefferson said of, 180 ; Napoleon 
said of,i8o ; Sheridan said of,l8l. 

New Testament practice, Return 
to, 331- 

Newton, Sir Isaac, theory of light, 
308. 

Niagara Falls, Blondin's cable, 
267 ; river and Avery's death, 
1 1 ; roaring cataract, 1 50. 

Nihilistic terrors, Russia, 246. 

Nihilists, Fanatical, 245. 

Observer, N. Y., statistical table, 

325. 

O' Kelly's religious movement in 
East, 318. 

Opinionism, Tyranny of, 239. 

Opposition, Ridiculous, to innova- 
tions ; to first stoves N. E. meet- 
ing-houses, to first tuning forks, 
etc., to first turnpikes in Eng- 
land, to first umbrellas, 298 ; to 
freedom of the press, 247 ; great, 
many adversaries, 82, 84. 

Opportunity and opposition, 79; 
an open door, 79; great, at 
Ephesus, to preach, 89; great 
and effectual, 82. 

Orator, A verdant, address of, 35, 
36. 

Ox and ass together, Thou shalt 
not yoke an, 3. 

Oyster, Not an idea above an, 245. 

Pantheism, 256. 

Paradise, Lost : ridiculous French 
translation, 233 ; of God, 252. 

Parker, Theodore, says of Jesus, 
263, 265. 



Parson's tale, The, Chaucer, 2. 

Paths diverge, 45, 46. 

Patience, We should learn, 159. 

Patriarchs, communication with 
God, 146. 

Patriot, He is the truest, 96. 

Pauper clothed with sovereignty, 
244. 

Peasantry, Most brutish, 245. 

People, educated Atheists, revolu- 
tionists, 245 ; fanatical nihilists, 
245; get near to the, 129, 130; 
ignorant and debased, 245. 

Pentecost, First gift after inspira- 
tion on day of, 232. 

Plank-road, 34, 36; meeting, 35; 
we need a, 36. 

Plans for home missionary work, 
128. 

Platform, The, foreign missionary 
address, 196. 

Plea for Reformation, Encourage- 
ments justifying our: hierarchical 
arrogance, human creeds, nu- 
merous sects,religious mysticism, 
reverence for King James* ver- 
sion, 84. 
Plow, Thou shalt not, with ox and 

ass together, 3. 
Phalanx, Macedonian, in defense of 

truth, 343. 
Philosophy: Jewish, Greek, Orien- 
tal, 295 ; Locke's theory, present 
tendency, teachings of DescaTtes, 
etc., 255; materialistic writers, 
257, 258. 
Poems : Cotter's Saturday Night, 
56, 57; Death of John Foster, 
no; Seven Are We, 59 ; Thou, 
too, sail on, O Ship of State, 
195 ; Thy will be done, 100. 



358 



INDEX. 



Politician and Christian, 281. 

Politics during the war, in times 
of peace, 16. 

Population as it becomes denser, 
247; basis, vitality to digest, 
245 ; can't read and write, 25 
per. cent of our, 247 ; U. S. A., 
in 1875, 177. 

Pray, Thy kingdom come, 98, 99. 

Preachers fail to preach first prin- 
ciples, 332; young, charged to 
be loyal to Jesus, to dare to be 
right, to be faithful to his word, to 
set their faces against error, to be 
true to Christ in teaching, true to 
His whole truth, true to principles 
Divine, true to interests of His 
kingdom, 343. 

President, Assassin of our, consider- 
ately dealt with, guarded, pro- 
tected, 186. 

Press, Freedom of, opposition to, 
247; free, scourge of tyrants, 
115; power of the, 114. 

Principles, Christian, ascendency 
of, 248 ; known by their fruits, 
257; mixed, govern men, 16; 
weighed by results, 257. 

Pride of party, 239. 

Printing, a black art, a great art, 
112; John Quincy Adams on, 
112; Plato says of, 1 12; pro- 
gress of the art of, 1 16, 117; 
success to, 118, 119. 

Progress in 19th century, 172. 

Property in the U. S., Value of, 
184, 185. 

Protoplasm, source of life, 256. 

Providence must open door of 
access, 97, 98; voices of, come 
on breezes, 215. 



Purpose, Have one supreme, 271 ; 
of life, grand, ultimate, 254 ; 
our earthly, 252 ; supreme, 265 ; 
what your settled, 250; worthy, 
consecration to Jesus, 268. 

Purposes, Educational, benefac- 
tions, 184. 

Race, History of our, 136; human, 
six thousand years old, 139. 

Rebellion, Downfall of, 168, 169. 

Redeemed, The, robes clean and 
white, 29, 30. 

Redeemer, Divine, desire awak- 
ened, 70; the desire of all na- 
tions, 70. 

Redemption: God's eternal pur- 
pose in, 66 ; reasons for slow 
progress in, 64, 65. 

Reflections on growth of religion, 
76. 

Reformation : The, brotherhood of 
Christians,88 ; fifty years'conflict, 
89 ; gospel power of God, 87 ; 
no apology needed for, 90 ; plea 
for distinctive features of, 86; pure 
word of God light and food, 88, 
89 ; Scriptures rule of faith and 
practice, 87 ; unity of followers 
of Christ, 86. 

Regeneration : accompanied by 
dreams, etc. , a miracle, fearfully 
uncertain, God's work exclusive- 
ly, of sinner, no teaching and 
prayers, etc., realized after long 
struggles, result miraculous, sub- 
ject entirely passive, 313. 

Religion and science, conflict be- 
tween, 297; a matter of taste, 
of social advantage, 22 ; Brah- 
ma's confined to India, 223 ; 
Christ's, of humanity, 285 ; Con- 



INDEX. 



359 



fucius', confined to China, 223 ; 
Jesus' Evidence of divinity of, 
224; Mohammed's, offshoot of 
the Bible, 223; Pliny's defi- 
nition of, 71 ; progressive devel- 
opment of, 61 ; union of poetry 
and philosophy, 144 ; Zoroaster's 
confined to Persia, 223. 

Religionists' opposition to scientific 
truth, 297. 

Religious interests very sacred, 299 ; 
movements, beginning of century, 
318; progress, problem of, 182, 
183 ; successive dispensations 
of: Christian, Jewish, patriarchal, 

314,315- 

Religions, Leading, are ethnic,223. 

Renan, Ernest, says of Jesus, 263. 

Republic : ideal not yet realized, 
286. 

Rest, Haven of heavenly, 249. 

Revelation and nature, same au- 
thor, 63 ; God's, for all, 233: New 
Testament, a complete, 77, 78. 

Revolution against higher by 
lower classes, 246; communist, 
secret of, 246. 

Rhodes, D.W., on results of scien- 
tific experiments, 309. 

Richter, Jean Paul, says of Jesus, 
262. 

Richards, James, 210. 

Rock, Flinty — quarry in, 214; 
hard drilling into, 215; in sea 
of doubt, 257 ; like a, strong 
and calm, 283 ; stubborn, drive 
sparks from, 214. 

Roman people, one idea — conquest, 
147 ; military genius, 146. 

Rome, Downfall of, 15. 

Russia, Nihilistic terrors, 246. 



Russia's progress in 19th century, 

173- 

Ruler, The Divine, governs events, 
142. 

Ryland, Dr., spread of gospel in 
foreign lands, 213. 

Saladin the Great, — of all his 
glory, 289. 

Salvation not arbitrary, 65, 66. 

Savage : life, — freedom — limited 
wants, naked, snoring in wig- 
wam, 250. 

Savagery, primitive, Remanded to, 
250. 

Saved, What must I do to be, 

315. 

Schaff, Dr. Philip, says of Jesus, 
261. 

Scheme by master minds : to 
eliminate idea of a personal God, 
to exclude miracles, to reduce 
operations of matter and mind, 
leads to Atheism, 255, 256. 

Scholar, Good and faithful, 270. 

Scholars : all may attain eminence 
of goodness, 270; armed for 
service, 248; few attain emi- 
nence, 270. 

Schools, Free, opposition to, 247 ; 
public, less moral teaching, 247. 

Science, Charlatanry of, 317; 
oppositions of modern, 299; 
oppositions of modern to script- 
ural teaching, 294, 296; Physical 
laws of, 228 ; results not final, 

3°9- 
Scientific martyrs burned at stake, 

300. 
Scientists' denial of the Bible, of 

Christianity, of miracles, of the 

supernatural, 303 ; deny a per- 



360 



INDEX. 



sonal God, 301 ; dogmatists, 300 ; 
fierce quarrels among themselves, 
300; ignore the Creator, 302; 
reduce every thing to material- 
ism, 306; should be modest,3io. 

Scotch-Irish peopled Western 
Pennsylvania, 312. 

Scott, Walter, acquaintance with 
the Campbells,32i ; disappointed 
in N. Y. church, 319; employed 
by Mahoning Association, 335; 
expounded the truth, 323 ; first 
to preach Christhood of Jesus, 
322; first to preach divinity of 
Jesus, 322 ; introduced religious 
reformation at New Lisbon, 312 ; 
meets Isaac Errett at New Lis- 
bon, 319; new advocacy of gos- 
pel, 317 ; praised Henry Errett's 
lectures, 319; preaching, result 
of investigation, 322; proclaimed 
the truth, 323; under reforma- 
tory influences, 318; vindicated 
the truth, 323; visited New 
York, 318 ; won place among the 
religious movements of the age, 
312; won many thousands to 
Christ, 323 ; won preachers to his 
plea: Allerton, Bentley, Bos- 
worths, Collins, Finch, Gaston, 
Jos., Haydens, Hartzel, Henry, 
Hubbard, Mitchell, Moss, Ran- 
dolph, Seacrist, Schaeffer, Wil- 
liams, 324. 

Scriptures, De Quincy on transla- 
tion of, 73, 74 ; Hebrew transla- 
ted into Greek, 72, 73; prejudice 
against translation giving way, 
328 ; superstitious reverence for 
common version, 316; versions 
of, 221. 



Sectarian a, heresy hunter, 237. 

Sectarianism essential to purity of 
church, 317; evils of, 329; not 
dead but sleepeth, 331 ; normal 
and healthy, 317; rampant,3i7; 
resulted in envy, strife, etc., 317. 

Sects among works of the flesh, 
hostile to aim of the Bible, must 
be abandoned, 237. 

Seeds, Divers kinds of, mingle and 
degenerate, 57. 

Self-assertion greatly needed, 12; 

Self-government, Capacity of man 
for, 166-177 ; experiment daring 
175, 176, 244; experiment haz- 
ardous, sublime, if successful, 
blissful consequences, unsuccess- 
ful—plowshare of ruin, 244. 

Self-hood, a little too far, sacred, 
honored, 12. 

Serfs, Emancipation of, 173. 

Seven Are We, poem, 59. 

Shakespear : Ludicrous translation 
into Latin, 234. 

Sharpen and drill and dull, 214. 

Ship of State, Thou, too, sail on, 

O, 195. 

Shore, Hugging the, 215. 

Shortcomings, Our, 127. 

Singleness of aim, 250. 

Sinners learn in school of experi- 
ence, 65. 

Skeleton, Domestic, 45. 

Slavery, Downfall of, J 68, 169. 

Societies, Bible, 183 ; Bible, Scrip- 
tures in all languages, 221 ; 
Bible, taught men to rely on 
Word of God, 328 ; missionary, 
taught men to rely on Word of 
God, 328 ; temperance, Y. M. 
C. A., etc., 40, 41. 



INDEX. 



36I 



Society, C. W. B. M., report, elev- 
en years' work, 326; F. C. M. 
report, eleven years' work, 326; 
foundations trembling, 247 ; G. 
C. M. C, 325; heathen mis- 
sions — Hoosac river, at hay- 
stack, 210, 211; O. C. M. S. 
established, 325; Y. M. C. A., 
uprising against clerical authori- 
ty, 329. 

Spain waking out of lethargy, 1 74. 

Specialties, Danger of running 
into, dwarf the individual, econo- 
my demands, well for society, 
252, 253. 

Spies sent to promised land, 215. 

Spontaneous generation, 302, 308; 

Stanley, Henry M., 173, 220. 

Star, Polar, gives forth light, 215. 

Stars of promise hang over us, 215. 

Stone, Barton W., religious refor- 
mation in West, 318. 

Stoves first brought into New 
England meeting-houses, 298. 

Straus, David Frederick, says of 
Jesus, 263. 

Strife between labor and capital, 
246. 

Strike, Railroad, foretaste of revo- 
lution, 246. 

Success, Final and perfect, 272; 
not gained by diploma, 249. 

Sunday-school instruction, 50, 51. 

Sunday-schools, 1880-1890, 183. 

Supernatural, Loss of faith in, 
258, 259. 

Take care, — rapids below, n. 

Time, Fullness of, had come, 71, 
72 ; sea of, life adrift, 249. 

Theologians and dogmatism, 308. 

Theological institutions, with per- 



manent funds, with thousands of 
students, 184. 

Tomahawk and scalping knife, 250. 

Translated, The Bible? 231. 

Translation, Anglo-Saxon and An- 
glo-American must lead in, 238 ; 
apparatus, critical, 241 ; a sacred 
mission, 242 ; arguments for bet- 
ter, 232; complete, of scriptures, 
238 ; desirableness of, 239; errors 
of, in words of the Divine Spirit, 
234; in other languages, 238; 
judged by party interests, 239; 
ludicrous instances of, 233 ; 
needs to complete work, 240, 
241 ; object of, 233 ; practicabili- 
ty of, 239 ; very important, 233 ; 
who decides against, 231 ; work 
of, the, 242. 

Translators, men of rare attain- 
ments, 241 ; need purging of 
idols of the den, 239 ; those who 
fail to approve, 230 ; those who 
need lustration, 230. 

Truth, A, projected into distinct- 
ness, 323 ; dynamite of gospel, 
225 ; ends of, not secured by com- 
promise, 332; every new, com- 
bated, 298 ; harmonious, 297 ; 
idols blockading approaches to 
temple of, 228; Lord, let us 
know thy, 239; misconceptions 
of conflict grows, 297 ; pining in 
dungeons for sake of the, 215; 
progress, discovery, development 
of, 230 ; ready to live or die for 
the, 323 ; sanctify them through 
thy, 239; spiritual beauties of, 
239; unfolding beauty through 
the, 239; what is, — sermon, W. 
A. Lillie, 278. 



362 



INDEX. 



Tyndale, William: dying prayer, 
given to the flames, martyrdom, 
230. 

Tyndall, Prof.: impassable chasm, 
307 ; resolving mind into matter, 
301. 

Umbrellas, First appearance of, 
298. 

Union, Christian, desirable, 329; 
Christian, ridiculed, 317; practi- 
cal exhibition, 336. 

Universe, Material and spiritual, 
evolved out of nomads and fire- 
mist, 299, 311. 

Upham, F. \V., 321. 

Urim and Thummim, 230. 

Usages, Denominational, source of 
weakness, 230. 

Vanity illustrated, 12. 

Vessel left to drift, sure of wreck, 
249. 

Victory, Complete, 272. 

Virchow, Prof., matter giving birth 
to mind, 317. 

Voice, A, to all classes and grades, 
281 ; to all honored with trusts, 
281 ; to all sons of ambition, 
to the church, 287 ; to the peo- 
ple, 281; to the nation, 280; 
to those in power, 281 ; of la- 
mentation and woe, 275. 

Voters, Illiterate, 168. 

Voyage of life, 32, 3^. 

Wakefield, Vicar of, translated, 

233- 
Waldenses of Luzerna, heroic 

choosing, pledge, 231. 
Ward, Artemas, 39. 



Wars, Civil, 185; with other pow- 
ers, 185. 

Washington's greatness, 1 6 1. 

West, The, reformatory religious 
movements, 312. 

White, Thou shalt walk with me 
in, 33- 

Wickliffe, translator : bones dug up 
and burned, 230, 231. 

William the Silent, 31, 32. 

Woman can be trusted, 47, 48; 
genuine, battling against sin, 32; 
half of man, 26 ; heart of socie- 
ty, 25; rights of citizenship, 26, 
sees at glance what man reasons 
in an hour, 48; when started 
wrong, 26; young, fairest speci- 
men, linsey woolsey garments, 
veneered, 13, 15. 

Woman's charm in her delicacy, 
etc., 27 ; rights at war with na- 
ture, 26, 27. 

Women : busy watching neighbors, 
38 ; can fight, and bravely, 28 ; 
different from men, 25 ; plea for 
a particular class of, 29 ; young, 
at boarding school, 52 ; what 
shall be done for, 29 ; education 
of, in Hungary, 54, 55 ; in love, 
52, 53; married, 53. 

World, A, in tears, 274; by wis- 
dom knows not God, 302 ; can 
be saved, 227 ; Divine Architect's 
plan for building, 64: temple of 
Jehovah's praise, 266; wonders 
of, the sublimest, 32. 

Works of the flesh, 237. 

Zion's hill, We reap on, 216. 













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